Farmers’ food security in the volcanic area: A case in Mount Merapi, Indonesia

3.1.1 Gender

Gender is the most common demographic data of the respondents. Male and female respondents commonly exhibit particular characteristics in terms of perception or activities; males are generally dominating the physical activities. In the agricultural sector of Indonesia, gender is also an issue of concern for many parties. In Thailand or Philippines, female farmers are quite active in agricultural activities, but in Indonesia, male farmers dominate the activities [18,19]. But this study demonstrates that females also significantly contribute to agricultural activities. In this study, the genders of the respondents are presented by area (Table 3). With random selection, male or female respondents are not divided during the interview, as long as they are representing their households.

In Jemowo, Tlogolele, and Krinjing, majority of the farmers are male (72.97, 77.04, and 57.58%, respectively); the total is dominated by male with 67%. Contrarily, Glagaharjo has a different result; it is dominated by female farmers (52.46%). During the interview, since males were working outside, as sand miner [20,21], the interviewer met with female farmers representing their household. Aside from being related with physical activities, gender issues also arise in household management, for example, females dominated selling of agricultural products and controlling of household economy, this finding is supported by ref. [22], which reported that females are dominating the lighter agricultural activities compared with males.

3.1.2 Age

Numerous farmers in Indonesia are old. Aging farmers have become the current and future challenge in agriculture not only in Indonesia [23] but throughout the world, and this trend is raising due to low motivation of young people to work in agriculture [24]. Tlogolele, Krinjing, Glagaharjo and total show that farmers in the 28–40-year-old age range are dominating, with 37.78, 42.42, 29.51, and 30.36%, respectively. Meanwhile, Jemowo is dominated by farmers in the 41–53-year-old age range (Table 4). Based on the analyzed data, the average age of farmers from Jemowo, Tlogolele, Krinjing, Glagaharjo and toral area were 53.07, 43.73, 44.49, 47.57, and 46.87, respectively. This shows that Jemowo has the highest mean age of farmers.

The older the farmers, the more vulnerable the agriculture as the human resources are not strong enough to carry out agricultural activities. Age is also included in the analysis of factors affecting food security because it tends to affect people’s ability to work and perform decision-making [25]. Although this variable is not the only one that affects food security, it plays an important role in food availability and utilization.

3.1.3 Education

Education has become an important factor for people to live and survive in this modern life. With adequate education, people can perform accurate decision-making for their lives [26]. Indonesia itself already has a regulation to encourage people to study in a formal institution. It supports free education until senior high school and developed the program “12 years compulsory education,” in which people are required to finish formal education until junior high school [27].

Many Indonesian farmers, aged greater than 50 years old, have low formal educational level [28]. It may be due to not high awareness regarding achieving formal education in the past [29]. Currently, in the rural areas of Indonesia, many people are hesitant to send their children to formal education. Table 5 presents the farmers’ educational background, where in all places, including total, only graduated from elementary school are dominating, with percentages of 48.65, 62.22 45.46, 54.10, and 55.45%, respectively. Tlogolele has the highest percentage of farmers who only graduated from elementary school. In all areas, many people were still found to be uneducated in formal school. Glagaharjo was found to have the highest percentage of farmers who were uneducated, i.e., 22.95%. Glagaharjo is the most severely impacted area by frequent eruptions. Therefore, low educational level might be caused by the fact that people are more motivated to protect their properties and livelihood rather than getting formal education [6].

3.1.4 Family members

In Indonesia, there is no restriction in the number of kids, but it has a campaign called Keluarga Berencana or family planning to control the population [30]. This campaign motivates people to have only two kids. However, this campaign is not really effective in the rural areas. Many farmers in Indonesia have more than two kids, which is also affected by the Islam religion belief that many kids would drive a large amount of sustenance.

This study noted similar trend among the majority of the farmers to have family consisting of three or more memebers. Table 6 presents the number of family members that the respondents have. It can be seen that in all areas, a three-member family is common. Conversely, in Krinjing no respondent had only one family member. With many family members, farmers are more vulnerable because they need to feed more mouths with limited resources [31].

3.1.5 Farm size

Smallholder farmers are common in developing countries, including Indonesia. Farm land is an important factor of adequate food production. With limited farmland, farmers cannot produce food well [11]. Even if an intensification method exists, it is still limited [32]. Indonesia itself has only 360 m² average farm land owning by farmers. This farm size is very small to be optimized for food production, even only for farmers’ self-consumption [33].

This study also shows same trend where farmers are having small farm size with average of all respondent in each area and total are below 0.4 ha, they are 1841.08, 3655.89, 2875.76, 2718.83, and 2939.05 m², respectively (Table 7). In Jemowo and Glagaharjo, a 0–999 m² farm size is predominant with 33.79%. Meanwhile, Krinjing is predominated with farm size of 1,000–1,999 m² with 30.30%. Tlogolele shows the highest percentage of the farm size, i.e., over 4,000 m² with 30.37%. This area is known for vegetable production, and many farmers are optimizing their farm for commercial farming. For smallholder farmers like in this study, farm land expansion is difficult because the land prize is high, so they are trying to optimize the land they own.

3.1.6 Farming experience

The agricultural sector has many challenges. To overcome them, various changes should be done, and whether farmers will implement these changes or not will be determined depending on their knowledge, farming experience, and other motives [34]. As can be seen in Table 4, the average age of the respondents is more than 43 years old, which indicates that these farmers in general have quite long farming experience. In the Mount Merapi area, when agriculture is the main livelihood, people usually start working in agriculture in early age.

Farming experience as one of the factors affecting the farmer’s decision-making make it an important variable to be studied. In this study, the average of farming experience in all areas is more than 24 years (Table 8); it is matched with the average age, which is more than 43 years. Thus, it shows that farmers have started to farm at the age of around 20 years. Jemowo and Glagaharjo are dominated by farmers who have farming experience of more than 40 years (35.13 and 26.23%, respectively). Other areas are dominated by a range of more than 20 years. This long farming experience is expected to help farmers do better farming and accept any innovation for disaster mitigation.

3.2.1 Food availability

Food availability is the situation in which the available food is sufficient for the household members; it is not limited from self-food production or otherwise. Figure 2 presents the mean score of each indicator, FA-1 to FA-7; each indicator in each area has different results. FA-1 is concerned about the situation in which the farmers do not have money or other resources at a particular time in a year. In this variable, Glagaharjo has the highest score (4.07), suggesting that its situation is better compared with the other areas. Contrarily, Jemowo has the lowest score (3.38), suggesting that this area is quite drier compared with Tlogolele or Krinjing. Thus, the income of farmers is not high enough; some of them are raising livestock to support their families. FA-2 is concerned about the insufficient food, and Glagaharjo again has the highest score (4.11). This area also has the highest score in FA-3 (have to pass the eat), FA-5 (face food shortage), FA-6 (feel hungry but cannot eat), and FA-7 (does not eat for a whole day). Glagaharjo is also the area that was severely affected by the eruption, but the farmers here seem to have sufficient food. This may be due to the livelihood diversification conducted by farmers, such as working as sand miners. Research works [7,35] demonstrated that livelihood diversification is needed for rural households to overcome the challenges that they may encounter. Meanwhile, for FA-4 (eat lesser than the ideal consumption), Tlogolele has the highest score (4.01).

Figure 2

Mean of each indicator of food availability. FA-1 (in 1 year, there is a time when they do not have money or other resources); FA-2 (worry about the insufficient food consumption); FA-3 (have to skip the meal); FA-4 (eating less than the ideal consumption); FA-5 (families face food shortage); FA-6 (feel hungry but cannot eat); FA-7 (does not eat for a whole day).

The average of the total food availability variables is presented in Figure 4. Similar to the indicator of food availability in which Glagaharjo has the highest score, this area also has the highest score (4.14) in total also, followed by Tlogolele (4.01). Krinjing and Jemowo have scores of 3.95 and 3.63, respectively. The high score of Glagaharjo may be due to its economy, which is supported by sand mining. Meanwhile, the high score of Tlogolele may be due to its fertile land suitable for vegetables; this commodity has good earning and is sustainable for 1 year [36]. In one planting, farmers can harvest mixed crops at different harvest times, enabling them to earn money every month. Jemowo, which has the lowest score, has limited potency for commercial farming. The farmers in this area usually plant chili pepper, corn, and trees, such as clove and jackfruit; however, these trees cannot give enough money for the farmers’ households [37]. Additionally, one way ANOVA analysis shows that there is significant difference among regions regarding this food availability utilization with p-value 0.00 which is less than 0.05.

3.2.2 Food utilization

Food utilization means people are eating sufficiently energetic and nutritious foods [31]. Ten indicators have been used to describe this variable (as presented in Figure 3). The score of the food utilization indicator is quite different from that of the food availability indicator, in which Glagaharjo has the highest scores. The indicators in this variable show a quite different trend or score. FU-1 (cannot eat healthy and nutritious food) is seen to be below 4, Jemowo has the highest score (4.68), and Krinjing has the lowest score (3.12). It shows general condition of their daily consumption, where they think that their food utilization is not well enough, even above 3.

Figure 3

Mean of each indicator of food utilization. FU-1 (cannot eat healthy and nutritious food); FU-2 (consumption only of limited kinds of food); FU-3 (eating meat in a week); FU-4 (eating eggs in a week); FU-5 (eating vegetables in a week); FU-6 (eating fruits in a week); FU-7 (eating corn in a week); FU-8 (eating rice in a week); FU-9 (eating tubers in a week); and FU-10 (eating beans in a week).

Rice (FU-8) and vegetables (FU-5) are being consumed well by farmers, with all scores being more than 4. Rice is a staple food in Indonesia [38], especially in the study area. People in this area eat rice every day to obtain energy from carbohydrates. Vegetables are consumed as side dishes when eating rice [39]. Vegetables are also more affordable at all economic levels compared with meat [40]. Glagaharjo has the highest score for FU-3 (meat), which is 3.26, whereas the other areas have scores above 2.7 but below 3. The farmers commonly eat chicken meat as it is affordable; they can also raise chicken by themselves. Farmers that also raise cows (for cow milk or cow meat) can also consume cow meat during special occasions [41]. Other sources of carbohydrate being consumed by farmers are corn and tubers, with the latter being more common in the study area. Tubers such as cassava are commonly planted in the farm field usually for own consumption [37]. Corn has the lowest score compared with the other indicators. This may be because corn is not a staple food, and some of the farmers use it for livestock feed or sell it.

Fruit (FU-6) has a score of more than 3 for all areas, with Glagaharjo having the highest score (3.59). The fruits commonly consumed by farmers are banana and papaya, as these fruits can be easily planted in their home garden. Bean (FU-10) is commonly consumed as tempe (fermented soybeans) or tahu (tofu), which is very common for Indonesian people; they call it as Indonesian traditional food [42].

The average of the food utilization variable is presented in Figure 4. The food utilization in four areas had scores below 4, which is different from the food availability results for two areas with scores over 4. Tlogolele has the highest score (3.69), followed by Glagaharjo (3.69), Jemowo (3.54), and Krinjing (3.52). The high score of Tlogolele may be because in this area, a sufficient amount of vegetables is available, and also, this area is close to the market. The standard deviation of food utilization is more widely dispersed compared with food availability, for which the standard deviation is almost zero. It might be caused by the fact that food availability is quite equal for the majority of the farmers. Comparing food availability condition in each area, Independent T Test analysis shows that Jemowo, Tlogolele, and Total are significantly different, it means that in those areas, the food availability and food utilization are different, while they are significantly different in Krinjing and Glagaharjo (Figure 4). Additionally, one way ANOVA analysis shows that there are significant differences among regions regarding this food utilization with p-value 0.00 which is less than 0.05.

Figure 4

Mean value and standard deviation of total food availability and food utilization. Mean values ± standard deviation with different letters are significantly different (p < 0.05).