The Enchantment of the Agricultural Sector in Jambi Province

A stanza of the song “Pond Susu” sung by the legendary music group Koes Plus illustrates how rich and fertile the archipelago is.

As an archipelagic country and has a large area, Indonesia is blessed with endless natural wealth.

From the charm of its natural beauty for tourist destinations to other natural resources that can be produced, one of them is from the agricultural sector which can be a separate source of energy.

Indonesia's geographical conditions are very supportive for agriculture, so it is natural that the agricultural sector has a role in the economy.

Likewise, Jambi Province which has an area of ​​53,435 km2 with a land area of ​​50,160.05 km2 and is spread over 9 districts and 2 cities.

The agricultural sector is still a sector whose role is calculated in the economy of Jambi Province.

Based on data from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) of Jambi Province, the structure and growth of GRDP according to business sectors for the agricultural sector was 30.53 percent, followed by mining and trade at 19.39 percent and trade at 11.83 percent.

Based on the absorption of labor, the agricultural sector is the largest absorber of labor in Jambi.

In February 2022, 42.87 percent of the working age population is in the agricultural sector.

This is followed by the trade sector at 17.13 percent and the manufacturing industry at 6.81 percent.

The agricultural sub-sector which is Jambi's mainstay is plantations, it is proven that Jambi in 2021 ranks fourth largest on the island of Sumatra with palm oil production of 2.6 million tons.

Other commodities are rubber with a production of 310 thousand tons, coconut 116 thousand tons, and coffee 20 thousand tons.

Seeing these conditions, it is very possible that the agricultural sector is still the concern of all parties.

Various issues that arise and become the attention of the community, business actors and the government are agricultural human resources (HR).

The 2018 Inter-Census Agricultural Survey (SUTAS) noted that 44.27 percent of Jambi's farmers were farmers of productive age under the age of 45.

This means that Jambi farmers are dominated by parents and there are still few young people who want to go and work in the agricultural world.

The sustainability of the future of agriculture is highly dependent on the interest of the younger generation, if the interest and interest in working in agriculture decreases, it is very risky to meet the food supply of the population as the population increases.

Another issue is the conversion of land for residential use, business premises and for other building facilities.

The control of paddy fields by farmers is also very small, ranging from 0.25 to 0.5 ha.

Strategies to overcome the problem of negative impacts that arise require accurate agricultural data, regulations that favor farmers and targeted agricultural programs.

The quality of the data will lead to the ultimate goal of a program that is right on target, at the right place and at the right time in order to increase the competitiveness of the agricultural world and can improve the welfare of farmers so that young people want to work in the agricultural world.

In 2023 there will be a very important activity for providing accurate agricultural data, namely the 2023 Agricultural Census (ST2023) which will be carried out simultaneously throughout Indonesia.

ST2023 covers 7 sub-sectors, namely Food Crops, Horticulture, Plantation, Livestock, Fisheries, Forestry and Agricultural Services with international standards referring to the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) program known as the World Program for The Census of Agriculture (WCA).

The purpose of ST2023 is to provide data on agricultural structures, especially for the smallest administrative units as Government data and information for planning, evaluating agricultural development and maintaining sustainable agriculture, hopefully in the future the agricultural sector will still be able to show its charm.