Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
hold Socio-economic Survey (SUSENAS) have been used. Initially introduced as an
emergency-relief measure, it has since become a core social welfare activity, offering
an alternative food security solution to rice price stabilization at the household level.
The shift in focus from nationwide input subsidies and BULOG consumer price
regulation towards targeted household programmes suh as RASKIN is stark.
However, implementation of suh targeted programmes carries its own administrat-
ive burdens. In a report prepared at the request of Bappenas, SMERU (2008) con-
cludes that the RASKIN programme has 'relatively low effectiveness' due to ineffi-
ciencies associated with allocation of rice from the primary distribution point to the
beneficiaries, inaccurate targeting of poor households and ineffectual monitoring.
The World Bank estimates that only 18 per cent of the total programme budget actu-
ally reahes poor households, whereas 52 per cent beneits non-poor households, and
the remainder is consumed by operational expenses and to ensure the profitability
of BULOG, whih is now managed as a state-owned enterprise (World Bank, 2005).
The period since 1998 has therefore involved a tentative policy shift towards assist-
ing household-level food accessibility through social welfare provision, while main-
taining a strong national focus on maintaining production of strategic food crops.
Conclusions: lessons from the 2008 food crisis for building the
resilience of national food systems
The preceding discussion has emphasized the relatively high financial and social cost
of pursuing food self-sufficiency goals at the national scale, particularly in a coun-
try experiencing a strong agrarian transition towards high-value horticulture and
off-farm incomes. It has stressed the importance of addressing food insecurity as a
phenomenon that ultimately affects households rather than nations. It also explains
recent food policy trajectories in Indonesia as the product of past collective national
experiences of food crises, deeply-ingrained cultural values and the rising political
influence of farmers' organizations. Ultimately, however, the costs of maintaining
this policy approah need to be balanced against the insurance it provides to with-
stand external perturbations in the world food system.
he future uncertainties that surround global food supply under hanging cli-
matic conditions, combined with the Malthusian hallenges of feeding a global pop-
ulation set to pass seven billion in 2011, indicate a higher level of risk than ever be-
fore. Under this scenario, the critical hallenge becomes how to incorporate risk and
build resilience in localized and national food security models. Indonesia's ability
