The Jakarta Post
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search results
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search resultsThe politics of soil
Statutory promises are meaningless without the political muscle to enforce them against deep-seated economic interests.
Change text size
Gift Premium Articles
to Anyone
Share the best of The Jakarta Post with friends, family, or colleagues. As a subscriber, you can gift 3 to 5 articles each month that anyone can read—no subscription needed!
Set as preferred source
Protesters rally in front of the Arjuna Wijaya Statue in Central Jakarta on Sept. 20, 2023, against a government plan to develop Rempang Island near Batam into a Chinese-funded economic zone that would displace around 7,500 people. (AFP/Yasuyoshi Chiba)
T
he House of Representatives’ rush to pass the long-awaited bill on agrarian reform just days ahead of National Farmers Day on Sep. 24 is a classic exercise in political messaging.
By steamrolling the legislation through legislative deliberations in barely two weeks after landing on the priority agenda, lawmakers secured a photogenic victory, while denying one of the nation's most crucial structural challenges the exhaustive public consultation it demanded.
This hasty political maneuver, however, should not blind us to the vital necessity of the law itself.
The human toll of Indonesia’s systemic land crisis is staggering. According to data from the Consortium for Agrarian Reform (KPA), over 2,933 structural agrarian conflicts erupted across the archipelago between 2015 and 2023 alone, impacting more than 1.6 million households and covering over 6.3 million hectares of contested territory.
On average, a major land conflict breaks out every single day in Indonesia, most commonly pitting smallholders and indigenous groups against corporate plantation syndicates, mining giants and state infrastructure projects.
Consider the violent standoff on Rempang Island, Batam, Riau Islands, in 2023, where the state deployed thousands of security forces equipped with tear gas against indigenous villagers who had inhabited their ancestral lands for generations.
Because the community lacked formal state titles, the land was designated a National Strategic Project (PSN) for an industrial "Eco-City," treating long-standing residents as mere illegal squatters.
