TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The Agriculture and Spatial Planning Minister Sofyan Djalil said that the Government is mulling a policy to maintain eternal paddy fields and prevent paddy field conversion.

“We will develop incentive and disincentive system,” he said after a coordination meeting at the Coordinating Ministry for Economic Affairs building in Jakarta on Monday, November 28, 2016.

Sofyan added that incentives would be given to paddy field owners to dissuade them from converting their fields. Indonesia has seen an increasing rate of paddy field conversion into both industrial and property land. The Government may provide some tax cut as an incentive, among others things.

Local governments wanting to develop industrial area will also be given incentives to stop them from acquiring paddy fields.

Sofyan said that the minimum area of eternal paddy field shall be maintained to meet people’s need for food.

He said that eternal paddy field program is stipulated in Law No. 41/2009 on Sustainable Agricultural Land Protection. Local governments are authorized to establish bylaws on eternal paddy field. “But local governments have been reluctant to issue such bylaw,” he said.

Sofyan pointed out to the example of Japan who maintained paddy fields through a substantial amount of subsidy, even though it has resulted in soaring rice prices.

VINDRY FLORENTIN