Failed Negative Feedback: Cash crop, Socio-Religious Life and Climate Change in Upland Java, 1850s – 2010s This is the story of changes among potato farmers in Dieng, upland Java: changes in climate, market crops, and social-religious life, that occur almost simultaneously. Every time we visit Dieng, the highest upland of Java, in the last three decades we see how the entire hill range is covered in potato fields, which spread from the valley to the hilltops.
At first glance, this landscape appears to be productive. However, without the presence of strong rooted vegetation for land cover, this hilly area, as recorded in history, is prone to soil erosion and landslides. Various studies also show how climate change, a decrease in soil fertility, and increasing pest attacks in the last three decades have dragged the production and productivity of potatoes to a sharp decline. A researcher critically calculated that if the trend of high environmental exploitation in Dieng continued without any conservation efforts, in 20-30 years the land there would lose fertility and farmers would not be able to plant anything. However, to date there is no indication of a decrease in the level of environmental exploitation in Dieng. Farmers continue to cultivate potatoes on a vast scale and intensive mode as if there were no problems whatsoever. Beautiful and luxurious new mosques were built in every hamlet and religious activities increased in the daily lives of the farmers. Why do Dieng farmers, despite climate change and a decline in production and productivity, keep planting potatoes? Why are there no efforts to reduce the farming efforts which directly have the potential to lower the rate of environmental destruction and improve farming productivity in Dieng?
Pujo Semedi, studied anthropology at Universitas Gadjah Mada, Ateneo de Manila University, and the University of Amsterdam with a focus on the political-economic study of resources and the rural environment. Since 1992 he has been a lecturer at the Department of Anthropology, Faculty of Cultural Sciences, Universitas Gadjah Mada. In the last 30 years Pujo Semedi has conducted a number of researches on fishing communities and fishing on the North Coast of Java, agriculture in the mountainous regions of Java, tea/coffee plantations in Java and oil palm in Kalimantan. Since then his research has expanded to agriculture and forest management in rural Ober Rhein, South Germany.
