Jakarta (ANTARA) - The Indonesian government will always prioritize the settlement of hundreds of agrarian conflicts through the agrarian reform program, which is President Joko Widodo's priority in 2019, and continuing into his second term in office.

Chief expert of the Presidential Staff Office and deputy chief of the Office's Agrarian Conflict Settlement Expediting Team (TPPKA-KSP) Usep Setiawan said in Jakarta on Wednesday that a ministerial meeting had agreed to the creation of cross-ministry and institution agrarian conflict settlement desk, with the Presidential Staff Office as coordinator.

The desk has set itself the target of settling 167 agrarian conflicts this year.

Since 2016, the TPPKA-KSP has received 666 cases of agrarian conflicts involving 1,457,084 hectares of land, with at least 176,132 families being affected.

Of the total, 414 cases have supporting data, so they can be easily followed up on.

Based on the analysis made by the TPPKA, 167 of these cases could be settled in the short-term, 92 cases in the medium-term and 154 cases in the long-term.

Also, 253 cases lack supporting data, and cannot be followed up on.

"We are still creating a schedule. The handling and settlement of the conflicts is the agenda, which is inseparable from agrarian reform. The agrarian reform is the president's priority until 2019 and into the next term of office, until 2024," Usep said.

(INE)

Translator: Virna P Setyorini, Suharto
Editor: Eliswan Azly
Copyright © ANTARA 2019