Farmers Meeting of Sempu Hamlet:
BACK TO OUR OWN ROOTS

The meeting is indeed spontaneously held. Pak Lan (for more, see: PROFILE), the farmer who maintains the farming land of PERDIKAN-INSIST Campus, informed two weeks before that some local farmers of Dukuh Sempu –a small village around PERDIKAN-INSIST campus in Km-19 of Kaliurang Street, Pakem, Yogyakarta—were interested to learn deeper about the organic farming practiced by Pak Lan in PERDIKAN-INSIST land. The Board of INSIST (Roem Topatimasang and Saleh Abdullah) immediately responded and invited Tanto as resource person. The alumni of Gajah Mada University who decided to be a natural farmer, that make him as a living example and often invited as resource person in many parts of Indonesia, agreed without hesitation, and this meeting was eventually held.

On 7 November 2009, 20 farmers, young and old, male and female, who own lands around PERDIKAN-INSIST campus, attended the meeting. Tanto started with one question: “Are farmers producers or consumers?” Almost everyone said: “Producers!” Than Tanto asked again: “Are you still buying vegetables and daily needs on food?” They replied hesitantly: “Yes...!” And the orientation dialogue took place.

According to Tanto, also confirmed by the farmers, Pakem and the vicinity areas, beside well-known as rice farming areas also used to be hoe producers. Now Pakem farmers, including the farmers of Dukuh Sempu, bought factory made hoe. Pakem was also known as producer of eel, rich of water sources, and rice fields were producing the whole year. One of the farmers who attended the meeting jokingly said: “We still have them now. But they run very fast, that we can’t see them anymore..”. An old farmer confessed that in the 60’s farmers in Pakem were still using manure, no chemical fertilizers at all. That was the golden era of agriculture in Pakem.

The conversation then moved to the comparison of modern farming equipments (such as tractor) and traditional ones (such as plow) to process the soil of the rice field. In fluent ngoko (daily) Javanese, Tanto explained the difference of the soil tilled with buffalo or cow and the one with tractor. The soil tilled with animals will be mixed from lower part to the surface, while a tractor will only mix only little bit of the surface. The farmers admitted it to be true based on their own experiences. In other words, this is not a romantic statement, but it is supported with real evidence. The conversation went on until magrib (sunset). As the farmers’ character who wants to see direct example, the farmers proposed to continue the meeting two days afterward.

The continuation of the meeting, 9 November 2009, was held in Sambirejo Village Hall, attended by the Head of Neighboring Assoiation and some village government staff. This time Tanto was accompanied by Gatot, a priest who practiced organic farming in dry land of Flores for many years. One of the results of this meeting was the willingness of one of the Sempu farmers to provide some parts of his land (3000 m2) as the demonstration plot for organic farming.

Yes, smash the iron when it is still burning!