CONSEQUENCES OF POLICY CHANGES ON
INDONESIAN IRRIGATION SYSTEM
MANAGEMENT
Effendi Pasandaran
Indonesian Agency for Agricultural Research and Development Secretariat, Jalan Ragunan No. 29,
Pasarminggu, Jakarta Selatan 12540
ABSTRACT
This paper highlights the policy changes and consequences on irrigation system management in Indonesia. The
scope of policy changes include management responsibility, investment and institutional development. As a
consequence of colonial government investment in public irrigation system, the management of irrigation
dichotomized into community and government based approaches. Further investment intervention into institutional
domain of local communities occurred in 1970s and 1980s in responding to Green Revolution technology and the
policy to meet self-sufficiency in rice production. Such policy intervention, however, has weakened the internal
dynamics of local communities and increased the burden of the government in operation and maintenance of
irrigation system. Within the framework of decentralization and new water law, the key policy reform is the
establishment of secure water rights. For this purpose, there is a need to empower the local communities and to
redefine the acceptable roles between government and local communities in irrigation management by taking into
account constraints to the shift in jurisdictional boundaries.
Keywords: Irrigation systems, policies, Indonesia
ABSTRAK
Konsekuensi perubahan kebijakan pada pengelolaan irigasi di Indonesia
Tulisan ini menyoroti perubahan-perubahan kebijakan dan akibatnya pada pengelolaan irigasi di Indonesia. Ruang
lingkup kebijakan yang dibahas mencakup tanggung jawab pengelolaan, investasi, dan pengembangan kelembagaan.
Sebagai akibat dari investasi pemerintah kolonial terhadap pembangunan irigasi terjadi dikotomi pengelolaan,
yaitu pengelolaan irigasi yang berbasis pemerintah dan yang berbasis masyarakat setempat. Investasi selanjutnya
yang terjadi pada tahun 1970-an dan 1980-an telah memperlemah dinamika internal yang ada pada masyarakat
setempat dan meningkatkan beban operasional dan pemeliharaan irigasi oleh pemerintah. Sebagai tindak lanjut
desentralisasi dan undang-undang sumber daya air, reformasi kebijakan yang diperlukan adalah reformasi tentang
hak atas air. Untuk pelaksanaan reformasi tersebut diperlukan peningkatan kemampuan masyarakat dan redefinisi
peran dan tanggung jawab antara masyarakat petani dan pemerintah dengan memperhatikan kendala-kendala
dalam pergeseran batas kewenangan.
Kata kunci: Sistem irigasi, kebijakan, Indonesia
I
rrigation in Indonesia was originally
developed by local communities
throughout the country particularly in the
fertile Islands of Java and Bali. The
process of capacity building evolved
over centuries through trial and error. It
began with the development of rainfed
rice fields in the valley or flood plain of
the river basin. It took about two and a
half millennia from the time of the
development of rainfed rice fields, which
occurred as early as 1600 BC, to the
invention of the small scale irrigation
systems which most likely happened at
the end of the first millennium (Van Setten
82
Van der Meer 1979; Ward 1985). Although
the early technology to divert water from
a river may be very simple with temporary
structures, which used to be repaired
seasonally, this innovation was considered as a major revolution in rice
culture, which then gave rise to important
social changes such as division of labor
and accumulation of wealth.
Despite the importance of irrigation
from a development perspective, the
rainfed rice field is still the prime component of the rice production system. It
was developed first and then irrigation
was added to the already established
blocks of rice fields to form an irrigated
rice production system. As accumulation
of knowledge increased, other commodities such as corn and soybean were
added to form irrigated rice-based
cropping systems. Further development
included the emergence of a complex ricebased farming system as other elements
were added such as inland fishery and
livestock.
The development of irrigation as a
public policy instrument was launched by
Dutch colonial ruler at the end of the 19th
century. There were several reasons for
the colonial ruler to introduce irrigation
Jurnal Litbang Pertanian, 23(3), 2004
as one of the basic policy instruments.
First, irrigation was considered effective
in alleviating the problems of prolonged
drought that caused famine as a result of
crop failure in some part of Central Java.
The process of large-scale irrigation
development, apparently, had taken
place as early as 1848, in the delta of
Sidoarjo, the downstream part of the
Brantas River basin, and then was
adopted to Central Java in northern
coastal area of Demak and of Grobogan
in 1870, which successfully overcame
the chronic problem of drought (Booth
1977).
Second, because of its policy on
trade liberalization, the foreign estate
companies began leasing lands for
cultivation of export commodities such as
sugarcane, indigo, and tobacco. Smallscale community irrigation systems were
considered not appropriate for large-scale
estate systems. At the same time, the
progress in hydraulic engineering
induced the development of large-scale
systems particularly at the alluvial plain
of the northern coastal area of Java.
In spite of a huge profit being made
by the foreign estate companies as result
of trade liberalization, the native
Indonesian remained poor. This is the third
and probably the most important reason
from the political economic point of view
for the colonial ruler to address the
welfare of the natives.
In addressing the parliament of the
Netherlands at the beginning of the 20th
century, Queen Wilhelmina launched a so
called “ethical policy” for Netherlands
Indie (Indonesia), which contained three
major policy instruments namely
irrigation, education, and migration of
the people. This was also to earmark the
era of large-scale public irrigation
systems in Indonesia after about 50 years
of trial and error. As a consequence of
this political commitment, an irrigation
based public agency was set up in
response to the implementation of big
irrigation schemes of a total irrigated area
of about 400,000 ha in Java.
This was considered the first
milestone in the history of the public
irrigation development in Indonesia with
the main objective to reduce the poverty
of the native Indonesian. As it will be
discussed in this paper that even though
this objective might not necessarily be
achieved, the development of irrigation
during the colonial period provided a
Jurnal Litbang Pertanian, 23(3), 2004
basis for the large scale adoption of the
Green Revolution after the extensive
rehabilitation that took place in the early
1970s to 1980s.
The second milestone therefore was
when the Government of Indonesia
determined to rehabilitate irrigation
systems in the early 1970s in response to
the Green Revolution technology. This
was also the era of centralized management of irrigation development and of
rice intensification. Despite the main
purpose of this irrigation development
and rice intensification program was to
achieve self-sufficiency in rice productions which was reached in 1984, but
during the same period the poverty
significantly reduced.
As was triggered by the economic
crisis since 1997, the Government of
Indonesia began the process to decentralize irrigation management since
1999, by the provision of the legal
framework. This is considered the third
milestone. The legal framework itself,
although it is necessary to a successful
implementation of the reformation
process, is not sufficient. Understanding
the process that took place in the past
such as the principles used in irrigation
management and the shift in the irrigation
management policy will help the government to facilitate the program to
empower local communities in irrigation
management.
For this reason, the principles of
irrigation management in the era of public
irrigation agency, the strengths and the
weaknesses of the chosen principles in
contrast with those used in community
driven irrigation systems are discussed.
It also discussed the consequences of the
shift in investment policy such as the cooptation of management, and finally it
provides insights on the ways to revitalize
community driven irrigation systems
following the provision of the legal
framework to decentralized irrigation
management.
THE PRINCIPLES OF IRRIGATION MANAGEMENT
The Principles Used in Community Driven Irrigation System
As has been discussed previously,
community driven irrigation systems
were first added to the existing blocks of
rice fields, and then after centuries of
experience, public irrigation systems were
added either to the existing community
driven irrigation system or to the existing
rainfed rice fields. Understanding the
principles used in community driven
irrigation systems may to a certain extent
help clarify the decision making process
that occurred at the tertiary unit of
the public irrigation agency. This is
particularly true for the first pattern,
namely the village community irrigation
system, dominantly located in hilly areas
and partly in the coastal alluvial plain of
Java. In this pattern, irrigation management is an integral part of the village
administration.
Although there are some variants in
management as reflected by variation in
cropping patterns, topographical characteristics of the region, and sources of
water withdrawls, which may involve a
certain right to water use, there are
inherent principles of water allocation
including proportional allocation to the
size of the blocks and consistently down
to the rice fields within a block. The
management flexibility is consistently
exercised depending on the water level in
the canal, ranging from a very decentralized practice particularly when water
supply is more than adequate to a
centralized system at the level of village
administration when water supply is
relatively scarce. The management
flexibility also allows the use of temporary
structures to control water distribution
within a block and intervillage water
allocation.
The second pattern is an autonomous community driven irrigation
system. The well-known subak system in
Bali is a good example of this pattern.
According to Geertz (1980), subak is not
only an irrigation organization but also a
democratic agricultural planning unit. The
dynamics of the subak system with its
ritual technology are further discussed
by Lansing (1991). The importance of the
ritual technology is viewed within the
context of harmonious relationships
between people, natural resources, and
God. The other characteristics of subak
include a water control system, which is
open to society and proportional division
of water at each bifurcation point. This
division of water itself is the reflection of
justice and democracy desired by member
of the subak. As a consequence of the
83
chosen division structures, the change
of flow at the headwork will be transmitted
equally to each bifurcation point within a
subak system (Horst 1998). This equal
transmission of change is also to reflect
the Rawlsian principle of justice namely
the principle of equality of opportunity
(Rawls 1971).
Developing the Public Irrigation
Systems: Lessons learned and
the principles used
Despite significant progress made by the
colonial ruler during the more than 50
years of trial and error in developing
hydraulic structures for irrigation, there
were lessons learned, which were
important for further irrigation development (Van der Giessen 1946). Developing
large-scale irrigation system was time
consuming. In general, it required more
than ten years to complete a single
irrigation project from construction to
operation although the projected
irrigation systems were generally
constructed on the already existing rice
fields. In the early stage of the
development of public irrigation, both
community driven irrigation systems and
rainfed rice fields were continually
developed. Data on irrigation and other
forms of land development between 1880
and 1915 indicate that in 1915 both
irrigated land and rainfed rice fields were
expanded by about 60% compared to
those of 1880 (Table 1).
In 1915, the area served by public
irrigation systems was about 30% of 1.60
million ha total irrigated land in Java. In
the early stage, the development of
public irrigation systems was relatively
slow. Between 1880 and 1910, for example,
technical irrigated area completed was
only 225,000 ha with an average
completion rate of 7,500 ha/year. In the
later stage as the stock of knowledge
accumulated, the completion rate
increased; between 1910 and 1930, the
technical irrigated area completed was
375,000 ha with an average completion
rate of 23,500 ha/year. The peak of
development occurred during the period
between 1930 and 1940 with the technical
irrigated area completed of 470,000 ha or
an average completion rate of 47,000 ha/
year. The total technical irrigated area
completed during the 60-year period of
development (1880−1940) was 1.07 million
ha. It appeared that economic depression
which occurred in 1930s and had a serious
impact on sugarcane industry in Java did
not diminish the commitment of colonial
rulers to develop the public irrigation
system in Indonesia.
As an integral part of the assessment
of the welfare of natives, Hasselman
(1914) reported that a commission was
established by the colonial rulers in 1904
to define the appropriate principle for
irrigation management. There were two
proposed options based on the practices
that had been undertaken in the field. The
first was based on the predetermined
yearly cultural plan, which consisted of
two major components, namely the
cropping system plan and water distribution plan (Gruyter 1933; Graadt van
Roggen 1935). The cropping system plan
refers to the arrangement of the crops
within an irrigation system in a given year
or in a given planting season, and the
water distribution plan refers to the
Table 1. Land development in Java (ha), 1880− 1915.
Year
Irrigated
land
Rainfed
land
Tidal
swamp
Dry land
1880
1885
1890
1895
1900
1905
1910
1915
1,060
1,191
1,201
1,244
1,260
1,292
1,387
1,618
580
686
712
723
770
743
762
746
33
38
37
35
40
45
46
56
438
534
579
630
798
837
1,142
1,161
Total
2,111
2,449
2,529
2,632
2,868
2,918
3,336
4,074
Ratio of irrigated
to total land
0.50
0.49
0.47
0.47
0.44
0.44
0.42
0.40
Source: Annuaire Statistique du Royaume des Pays-Bas: Les Colonies, 1888, 1895, 1914.
in Booth (1977).
84
allocation and scheduling of water supply
to meet crops demand for water of a given
cropping system plan. The second was
the recognition of the principle used in
community driven irrigation systems,
namely proportional water allocation
to all the blocks of rice fields as a
consequence of the principle of equality
of opportunity.
The first principle was determined
by the colonial ruler to be implemented in
a public irrigation system. A further
consequence was the establishment of
various rules in irrigation management
such as the golongan sistem on the
sequencing of irrigation delivery to
various section of an irrigation system
particularly during the beginning of a
rainy season when irrigation water was
not enough to be provided simultaneously and continuously to all sections.
Another important rule by the name of
pasten was related to water allocation
among various crops in terms of criteria
on relative irrigation requirements of
the crops, and the amount and time of
application during the crop season
(Pasandaran 1976). All these rules were
instituted by Algemeen water reglement or general water law in 1936 and
further details were stipulated in
provincial water regulation as a consequence of decentralization of public
services, including irrigation to provincial
governments in Java.
While there were many studies
undertaken to support the implementation
of the first principle during the colonial
period, only a few dealt with the
community irrigation system. Such
studies were reviewed for example by
Booth (1977) and by Pasandaran (2001).
The recognition of the performance of
community-driven irrigation systems,
however, was reported by van Witzenburg
(1936) when in the mid of 1930s he
observed that productivity of rice fields
in the Balinese subak was about 50%
higher compared to that of the public
irrigation system in Java. The reason for
such a high productivity was the better
water management in the subak.
A rather controversial issue raised
by scholars was the management of the
tertiary unit of a public irrigation system.
In Java, irrigation is managed by a village
bounded institution called ulu-ulu. This
institution was considered not compatible
with the management at the main system
level which is organized around a
Jurnal Litbang Pertanian, 23(3), 2004
hierarchical canal layout. As reported by
Clason (1936), an attempt was made in
Central Java since 1907 to establish a socalled distributor ulu-ulu, in managing
water at the tertiary level instead of a
village-bounded ulu-ulu system. It was
considered that the farmers were well
represented and from the interest of
public irrigation bureaucracy, “one tertiary
unit one management” was easier to
handle. This effort, however, was not
widely accepted simply because it was
not supported by the village administration.
Another controversial issue that
appeared during the era of large-scale
development of public irrigation systems
was the role of this public irrigation
development in improving the welfare of
society. During the first three decades of
the twentieth century, despite a huge
investment for the government operated
irrigation systems, the productivity of
dry-stalk rice in irrigated area remain
constant at a level slightly over 2 t/ha.
This was the likely reason pointed out by
Boeke (1966) to be skeptical about the role
of public irrigation systems in improving
the welfare of the people, while the
enthusiasts felt that irrigation was
considered the primary constraint of rice
production (Booth 1977). Both the
enthusiasts and skeptics, however, have
a valid reason but viewed from different
perspectives. The reason used by the
skeptics was quite right because the
public irrigation systems developed were
mostly located at the already existing
community driven irrigation systems and
at the rainfed rice fields, and without
additional production technology such as
fertilizers and high-yielding varieties will
hardly improve rice productivity.
The public irrigation systems, however, have a good construction quality,
particularly the so called “technical
systems”. They are equipped with control
structures and measuring devices down
to the tertiary turnouts. These technical
systems became very important assets
several decades later during the Green
Revolution when productivity of irrigated
rice and area harvested were significantly
improved enabling Indonesia to achieve
self-sufficiency in rice production in 1984.
Another reason for Boeke to be skeptical
was the fact that the people in Java
had fallen into the “Malthusian trap”.
While the productivity of rice remain
constant between 1880 and 1930, the
Jurnal Litbang Pertanian, 23(3), 2004
population leapt from 19.50 million to 41.70
million (an increase of more than 200%),
but this is not necessarily right since
irrigated land also increased from 1.06 to
3.27 million ha (an increase of more than
300%) during the same period. During
this period, the source of production
increase was mainly from expansion of
irrigated land.
DETERMINANT OF INVESTMENT AND COOPTATION
OF IRRIGATION MANAGEMENT
During the first two decades after the
Revolution for Independence (1950−
1970), the Government of Indonesia
adopted to a large extent the irrigation
development plan inherited from the
welfare policies of the colonial government. This period was marked by
investment on big multipurpose dams
such as the Jatiluhur reservoir in West
Java and initiation of swamp reclamation
through the polder system in Kalimantan.
Many of the run-of-the river type
irrigation systems gradually deteriorated
because of old age and insufficient repair
and maintenance.
The efforts to improve existing
irrigation systems were probably
triggered by the interest to achieve selfsufficiency in rice production and in
response to the advent of the Green
Revolution which since 1964 through “a
mass intensification program” began to
demonstrate a significant progress in
terms of yield increase. In the early period
of the five-year plan (Repelita) which
was launched since 1969, irrigation
investment played important role in the
economic development both in terms of
production and public expenditures. By
the 1980s, irrigation investments account
for more than a half of the public
expenditure for the agriculture and water
resource sector, with publicly-funded
irrigation accounting for 85% of irrigated
area and 75% of the country’s rice
production (Rosegrant et al. 1987).
The investment policies during the
five-year plans were translated into four
categories, namely 1) new irrigation
construction, which included investment
in new reservoir and diversion irrigation
systems, 2) rehabilitation of irrigation
systems, 3) tidal swamp water manage-
ment, which is relatively small systems
with few water control structures that rely
on tidal movement of water, and 4) river
and flood control. The priority was given
to the rehabilitation of irrigation systems
during the first two five-year plans and
then new construction during the
following five-year plans. During the first
plan (1969−1974), for example, more than
40% of the total irrigation development
expenditures were used for rehabilitation
(Table 2) .
Although declining in relative
importance, rehabilitation expenditures
increased substantially in absolute terms
through the third plan. Over the course
of the first three plans, expenditure on
construction of new irrigation systems
increased rapidly and received the
largest aggregate share of expenditure,
averaging 38% of expenditures during
the first three plans. Real expenditure on
new irrigation construction, however,
increased nearly ten-fold between the
first and the third plan. Investment on
tidal swamps, which received about 30%
of expenditures in the first plan, has
declined in relative importance, but has
received a nearly constant level of
expenditures in real terms.
Important determinants of investments on new construction seemed to be
profitability or cost effectiveness of new
irrigation systems, and the availability of
government resources and foreign
exchange. The price of oil and the level
of real GDP, therefore, have a highly
significant impact on new irrigation
investment (Pasandaran and Rosegrant
1995). The increased price of oil during
the 1970s and early 1980s not only
triggered the government to rehabilitate
the mandated portion of irrigation
systems (head-works, primary and
secondary canals and related structures),
but also improvement of the tertiary
systems, particularly the World Bank
IDA assisted irrigation projects.
In a new irrigation construction
project, the increased government
revenue also triggered the heavy involvement of government in rice field
development after construction of new
irrigation structures, which is against the
historical sequences of irrigated land
development. The difficulties with this
approach appeared for the first time in
1974 in the province of Lampung, at the
southern tip of Sumatra, when after the
completion of the project, as indicated by
85
Table 2. Total irrigation development expenditure by type of development
during Five-Year Development Plan (Repelita) I-IV.
Five-year development plan/
type of development
Current cost
(Rp billion)
Real cost1
(Rp billion)
Percent
distribution
Repelita I (1969−1973)
Rehabilitation
New construction
Swamp/tidal
River and flood control
114.50
50
25
33.10
6.40
171.90
73.70
38.30
50
9.90
100
42.87
22.28
29.09
5.76
Repelita II (1974−1978)
Rehabilitation
New construction
Swamp/tidal
River and flood control
717.10
147.60
197.30
152.30
219.90
582.40
138.80
185.70
50.10
207.80
100
23.83
31.89
8.60
35.68
Repelita III (1979−1983)
Rehabilitation
New construction
Swamp/tidal
River and flood control
1,908.20
556.30
759.80
109.70
482.40
913.20
263.40
358
54.60
237.20
100
28.84
39.20
5.99
25.97
Repelita IV (1984−1988)
Rehabilitation
New construction
Swamp/tidal
River and flood control
2,294.60
550.50
967.60
115.20
661.30
748.20
179.50
315.50
37.60
215.60
100
23.99
42.17
5.03
28.81
Note: 1Constant 1975/1976 rupiah.
Source: Ministry of Public Works in Pasandaran and Rosegrant (1995).
the availability of water at the tertiary
level, the migrant farmers community did
not respond properly in terms of
development of rice fields. Provision of
credit scheme was then launched to
accelerate the progress of land development in nearly all of the newly
constructed irrigation systems. Included
in the scheme was the assistance by the
government to lay out the farm level
irrigation ditches and design of rice fields.
Despite a substantial effort made to
expand irrigated area particularly outside
Java, the contribution of harvested area
was relatively low. Since 1970, the share
of harvested area to production increase
is less than the share of productivity
except during the period of 1995−2000
when productivity tended to decline
(Table 3).
The most likely reason for such a low
contribution of area expansion was the
long time required from the onset of
irrigation construction and on farm
development works. Furthermore, in the
early stage of production of the new
irrigated area, it took several years for the
farmers to adjust to the new production
environment, consequently the productivity at this stage was generally low. The
increase of production capacity is
therefore mainly realized through gradual
increase of productivity of the overall
irrigated area.
A further consequence of public
investment in irrigation is the development of water users' associations in
almost all public irrigation systems. This
government assisted water users
association is characterized by uniformity
in administration and organizational
base, namely a tertiary unit-based
organization. The expansion of this
approach has, to a certain extent,
changed the role of a traditional
institution namely village based irrigation
management. In some cases, the role of
the traditional ulu-ulu system was shifted
down to the quaternary level and in a
rather extreme case the existence of the
traditional systems totally disappeared.
In areas with strong support of village
administrations, however, water users
associations are maintained as the villagebased organization.
The development of the bureaucratic
version of water users’ association was
also enhanced by improvement of
community driven irrigation systems by
the public irrigation agency in the early
1990s .The consequence of this policy is
the adoption of standard design and
implementation procedures including the
water users’ association.
The total irrigated area of the
community driven irrigation system
reached 1.40 million ha in 1940, an increase
of about 16% from the irrigated area of
1880 (Figure 1). The conversion into
technical systems that happened in Java
Table 3. Change of harvested area, production and productivity of wetland and dryland rice (%).
Java
Year
1970−1975
1975−1980
1980−1985
1985−1990
1990−1995
1995−2000
Outside Java
Indonesia
Harvested
area
Production
Productivity
Harvested
area
Production
Productivity
Harvested
area
Production
Productivity
1.58
0.53
2.10
0.44
0.22
0.96
3.42
6.06
5.63
2.33
0.71
0.70
1.81
5.50
3.45
1.88
0.49
-0.26
1.33
1.93
1.71
2.02
3.23
-0.34
3.96
5.45
5.68
3.98
3.70
0.67
2.60
3.45
3.91
1.93
0.46
1.01
1.47
1.17
1.92
1.18
1.72
0.29
3.63
5.80
5.65
2.97
1.94
0.69
2.13
4.60
3.66
1.76
0.22
0.27
Source: Central Bureau of Statistics in Pasandaran (2001).
86
Jurnal Litbang Pertanian, 23(3), 2004
Million ha
Total irrigated area
Community driven irrigated
area
3
2
1
0
1880
1910
1940
Year
Figure 1.
Total irrigated and community driven irrigated area,
1880−1940 (processed from
Booth 1977 and Burger
1975).
between 1970 and 1990 reduced the area
managed by the local community but
increased the area served by the public
agency (Figure 2). Consequently, the
burden on operation and maintenance
of the government was increased, and
participation of the water users’ associations in operation and maintenance
was not as expected.
REVITALIZATION OF COMMUNITY DRIVEN IRRIGATION
The fact that direct public intervention in
community driven irrigation systems
exacerbates dependency on the government and weakens the internal dynamics
of the local community was recognized
later when many of community driven
irrigation systems were converted into the
bureaucratic system. The trial of irrigation
management transfer was done in the
early 1990s and then followed by the
Million ha
Total irrigated area
Community driven irrigated
area
6
4
2
0
1970
1980
1990
2000
Year
Figure 2. Total irrigated and community driven irrigated area,
1970−2000.
Jurnal Litbang Pertanian, 23(3), 2004
transfer of the government operated
small scale systems to the water users’
association. According to a Presidential
Decree of 1999, the transfer of irrigation
management should be done gradually,
selectively, and in democratic manner to
water users’ associations.
Lessons have been learned from the
one century of irrigation development
during colonial period and then 50 years
after independence. First, as it has been
discussed in this paper, public irrigation
development by colonial ruler and to
certain extent by the Government of
Indonesia was based on the work that
had been pioneered by local communities.
The summary of the policy changes and
their consequences is presented in Table
4.
During the colonial period, despite
direct cooptation by the government, the
opportunity to do the pioneering work
such as small scale irrigation and rice
field development was still available and
feasible to be done by the local
communities. The internal dynamics of
these local communities were at least
maintained to open up new frontier and
to operate and maintain their own
irrigation systems. Included in the internal
dynamics are the internal rules that
regulate people's relationships within the
local communities and with their external
stakeholders (Guerra 2004).
These internal dynamics, however,
have weakened since the last three
decades when the intervention of the
public agency penetrated deeper to the
domain of the local communities in terms
of improvement of tertiary units and
rehabilitation of community driven
irrigation systems. This is also true for
the newly constructed irrigation system,
as the approach used to rice field
development has created or even
increased dependency of the local
communities on the government. The
declining capacity to open new area has
also been affected by the increase cost in
new construction of irrigation system and
in new irrigated land development .
Second, as a further consequence of
the declining capacity to open new
irrigated area, both on the part of the
government and the local communities,
the growth of irrigated area during the
last four decades has been declining.
Irrigated area increased about 50% from
3.50 million ha in the year1955 to 5 million
ha in the year 2000. During the same
period, the global irrigated area increased
more than 300% from 80 million ha in
1955 to 270 million ha in 1995 (FAO 2000).
The cropping intensity of rice in irrigated
area had increased from 110% in 1955
to 170% in 1995. With the increased
productivity of more than double as a
result of the Green Revolution, Indonesia
could afford to produce sufficient rice
until the early 1990s.
Third, in recent years, however,
especially in Java both productivity and
area harvested tended to decline. In such
a situation, it would be difficult to expect
a production leap in coming decades
because of the weakened capacity to
open up new irrigated area and to improve
productivity. The policy to decentralize
the government tasks to the district level
and the government political will to allow
the water users’ associations to have a
greater role in managing irrigation
systems is necessary but not sufficient
to strengthen the internal dynamics of the
water users' associations. Investment in
both human and technological capital is
needed in irrigation systems formerly
initiated by the local communities and in
irrigation systems developed by the
government through the direct investment approach.
Government regulation no. 77 of the
year 2001 provided the legal framework
for the local community to take larger
responsibility in irrigation management.
This regulation however is considered
"over decentralized" by irrigation
bureaucracy, and the new government
regulation is being proposed to provide
a new framework for management
responsibility in response to the newly
emerging water law of 2004. This water
law reconfirmed the jurisdictional role of
government in irrigation management
and provided the basis for integrated
approach to water resource management
within the river basin. Despite the rules
in water law tend to undermine the
important role of local communities in
irrigation management and to a certain
extent recentralized the managerial
decision making (Pasandaran 2003), this
water law provided broader scope for
integrated approach in water resource
management.
The challenge a head is how to
implement this water law effectively, so
that good governance can be created.
One of the priorities is the establishment
of strong water rights by taking into
87
Table 4. Policy changes and consequences on irrigation management by stage of development in Indonesia.
Stage of
development
Objective and
rationale
Implementation
Colonial era
(1848−1949)
Objective: development of
public irrigation system
Rationale: improvement of
the welfare of the natives
Construction of new
irrigation system in the
area served by community
irrigation systems and in
rainfed area
Consequence
Change in principle of
irrigation management:
adoption of cultural
plan
Division of management
responsibility between
government and local
community
Maintaining capacity of local
community to manage irrigation
system and to open up new
irrigated area
1950−1969
Objective: continuous
development of public
irrigation system
Rationale: continuous
improvement of the
welfare of the farmers
Construction of reservoirs and
irrigation system in limited area
Maintain the same management
responsibility with that during
colonial era
Centralized
government and
Green Revolution
era (1970−1999)
Objective: rehabilitation
of existing systems and
expansion of irrigated area
Rationale: achieving and
maintaining rice
self-sufficiency
Direct intervention by public
agency in rehabilitation of
tertiary and community
irrigation system, and
development of rice fields
in new irrigated area
uniformed water user(s)
association
Weakened capacity of local
community in irrigation
management and land
development
Decentralized
government and
empowerment of
local community
(1999−2004)
Objective: transfer of
responsibility in irrigation management to
local community
Rationale: to reduce the
burden of the government
Provision of legal framework
development of program to
empower local community
(Government regulation no. 77/
2001)
Expected consequence:
revitalized capacity of local
community
Integrated approach
to river basin
management
(2004−
)
Objective: development of
legal framework
Rationale: cross sector
management of water
resources
Water law no. 7/2004
Development of river basin
organization
Redefinition of multistakeholder roles in water
management
Development of water
rights
account the cultural and institutional
endowment in water resource management (Rosegrant et al. 2002).
This water right problem is particularly relevant for Indonesia because
of the fast increase of demand for water
from other sectors. The question is not
whether water will move from agriculture
to other sectors, but whether the rights
of the farmers in terms of secured amount
of water and farm incomes are protected
(Rosegrant and Ringler 2004). It is also
important because of the frequent
occurrence and expansion of the area
under water scarcity (Katumi et al. 2002;
Molden 2002).
88
Within this water right framework,
the capacity of the local communities in
the process of negotiation with other
stakeholders need to be developed.
Increased capacity is also needed for the
local communities to take greater responsibility in management of irrigation
systems.
For this purpose, in the short run
there is a need to develop a historical
profile of the irrigation systems in terms
of the shared role of both local
communities and the government in the
whole process of both land and irrigation
system development. It has also to be
further identified the development trend
of managerial capacities of the local
communities and their water users’
associations and possible constraints for
the existing associations to take greater
responsibilities in managing irrigation
systems. The expected role of the
government and other stakeholders is to
facilitate the development of the agenda
of the local communities and more
specifically water users' associations as
equal partner in management of irrigation
systems. Included in the role of the
government is the facilitation of the
change in the principle of water allocation
if it is desired by farmer communities and
probably to facilitate the management of
Jurnal Litbang Pertanian, 23(3), 2004
conflict, which emerged as a further
consequence of the decentralization of
public irrigation management to the
district government.
This historical profile is expected to
be used as a benchmark in setting
priorities for the long term development
of the local communities in irrigation
management. The local communities with
high performance in management are
ready to take greater responsibility in
irrigation management and ready to
negotiate the water rights with other
stakeholders in the river basin.
A more specific program has to be
developed for the local communities with
less performance in irrigation management, by taking into account their present
position in the whole range of process
in irrigation management and constraints
to further development. The local
communities with slow progress in
managerial performance need a program
to accelerate the development progress
of their managerial capacities. It includes
incentive to improve performance of the
water association and the capacity to
negotiate water rights. The local
communities with declining progress
need a program to consolidate their social
capital and to further strengthen their
managerial capacities.
Included in the long run development framework is a need to empower the
local communities particularly outside
Java to do pioneering work in land
development in the areas which are
considered feasible for new irrigation
systems. If the capacity of the local
communities improved, the investment
funds for irrigation development could
be channeled through water users'
association.
CONCLUSIONS
In 1999, the Government of Indonesia
decided to reform the management of
irrigation system by providing a legal
framework to enable the local communities to share a greater responsibility in the management of public
irrigation. In implementing this policy
reform, however, the lessons learned from
the past experience have to be taken into
account. The experience can be traced
back to the colonial period when the
large scale public irrigation systems were
developed and the principles used in
irrigation management were determined.
When the Government of Indonesia
decide to meet self-sufficiency in rice
production in the early 1970s, a large
amount of investment was made to
rehabilitate the existing irrigation systems
and to develop new irrigated areas in
outside Java. In accelerating the process,
the community driven irrigation systems
and the tertiary units of the service area
of the public irrigation agency were also
rehabilitated.
The development of a uniformed
water users' associations was enhanced
and the adoption of the standard design
and procedures was used by ignoring
the principles practiced by the local
communities. Consequently, the burden
of operation and maintenance of irrigation
system by the Government was increased
and the participation of the local
communities was weakened. To cope with
these problems, key policy reform
particularly in response to the new water
law is the establishment of the secure
water rights as a further consequence of
fast increase in demand for water from
nonagricultural sectors and the frequent
occurrence of water scarcity.
In the short run, there is a need to
define the acceptable role of both local
communities and the government in the
whole process of both land and irrigation
system development. The present status
and trend of managerial capacities of the
local communities and the possible
constraints in taking greater responsibility in irrigation management need to
be identified as a benchmark for priority
setting and in negotiating water rights.
Include in the long run agenda on
policy reforms is a need to empower the
local communities particularly outside
Java to do pioneering work in land
development in the areas which are
considered feasible for new irrigation
system. This is needed to anticipate the
shortage of production capacity.
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