To encourage the modernization of agriculture with the assistance of machinery and agricultural equipment have been going on since 2015.
"The use of Alsintan to encourage agricultural modernization can increase farming efficiency by 35 to 48 percent," Director General of Agricultural Infrastructure and Facilities (PSP) Pending Dadih Permana noted at a press conference.
The director general remarked that Alsintan was provided in the form of two-wheeled tractors and four-wheeled tractors; water pumps; rice transplanting equipment; choppers; cultivators; excavators; hand sprayers; corn planting tools; and semi-manual corn planting devices.
There were 54,083 units of Alsintan distributed to farmers in 2015 and 148,832 units were provided in 2016; while in 2017, there were 84,356 units channeled to them and Up October 2018, a total of 385,170 units had been distributed. Alsintan was given to farmer groups/association of farmer groups and Alsintan Business Service.
Permana explained that the Ministry of Agriculture encourages modernization in agricultural cultivation as a whole, including land-processing activities, planting, harvesting, and processing agricultural products.
"The younger generations are more and more engaged in agriculture activities, from land processing to harvesting," the director general of agricultural infrastructure and facilities explained.
The agricultural modernization movement has also helped to expand swamps. Based on data from the Swamp and Tidal Regions Data Center, Indonesia has potential swamp land of 33.4 million hectares, consisting of land in tidal area of 20.1 million hectares and swamps of 13.3 million hectares.
Efforts to use swamp land with a pattern of land optimization have been initiated since 2016. In 2016, the PSP directorate general carried out optimization activities of 3,999 hectares of swamps, and then in 2017, it covered 3,529 hectares and 16,400 hectares in 2018 (as of Nov 5, 2018).
In 2019, the Ministry of Agriculture, through the Directorate General of PSP, plans to develop a swamp area of 500 thousand hectares spreading across Kalimantan, Sumatra, and Sulawesi.
Over the past four years, the PSP directorate general`s policy and program has focused on the development of four agricultural commodity sub-sectors, namely food crops, horticulture, plantations, and livestock.
Reporting by Mentari Dwi Gayati
Editing by Andi Abdussalam
Reporter: antara
Editor: Heru Purwanto
Copyright © ANTARA 2018
