Palm oil cluster resilience to enhance indigenous welfare by innovative ability to address land conflicts: Evidence of disaster hierarchy

1.1 Land resilience and acceleration of indigenous welfare as flexible analytical literature

Reflecting the perspective of political economy theory in the literal sense of a very broad political ecology, natural appropriation is influenced by capitalist social correlations [3]. Therefore, the polarization of natural resources is not only a physical entity but also includes the labor force and land use relations, as well as transnational unequal distribution and consumption channels [18]. According to Watts et al. [19], a technocratic strategy to persuade village people to change land functions with production effectiveness consists of a dipolar approach that aims to overcome the socio-ecological crisis of capitalism. This dipolar strategy tries to mitigate changes in the perceptions of rural residents by reducing the impact of ecological disasters and eliminating land conflicts by updating the accumulated value in the development of the emergence of a green economy paradigm. Thus, new resilience for land expansion frame capital emerges and represents new resource discoveries [20].

The conflict triggered by the resilience of the expansion of production land is about land tenure which, as empirically explained by Dadashpoor and Somayeh [21], is that viewing land tenure means “practices” that improve or consolidate access, claims, and exploitation for some time. Then the empirical view of Williams et al. [22] reminds us that the estimates of an increasingly global supply of palm oil plantation resilience products reap the presumption of fears of the threat of natural degradation disasters hampering the process of the welfare of indigenous farmers. In addition, according to the theoretical view of Jean et al. [23], the intensification of palm oil lands encourages the conversion of additional forest lands through factors that increase profitability and return of intensive agricultural land, which leads to the welfare of indigenous peoples and in turn will encourage further expansion of palm oil lands. As noted by Qaim et al. [4], the view of this empirical review is that the elasticity of the resilience of palm oil agricultural land and that the increase in inputs do not reduce native motivation to expand planted areas, which is a reasonable assumption when an analysis of demand for palm products results in a “rebound” effect “to the welfare paradox.”

Comparison of the proposed hypothesized concepts and mechanisms found rigorous theoretical and empirical verification. For example, the empirical verification of Fallahpour et al. [24] presented four economic modulations, which theoretically show palm oil resilience scenarios regarding accelerating indigenous welfare, which concludes that output prices, wage levels, and access costs are the most important determinants in maximizing the output utility of land rent. Meanwhile, regarding empirical and theoretical assumptions, Varkkey et al. [25] argued that the resilience of agricultural commodities in palm oil is associated with various types of reflections and substantial evidence of indigenous welfare, which seems to indicate the latest technological developments. Nsangou [26], looking at the evidence of expansion in the tropics, found that for less than 2–3 years, the natural resilience of palm oil lands slowed down the transfiguration of rural areas, so that the acceleration of welfare data indicators began to experience defensive migration.

In a literature review by Romero et al. [27] shows the relative effects of transforming traditional village life towards centralized changes in palm oil plantations, followed by three broad perspectives. First, the tendency of control village characteristics to choose a baseline that remains in the livelihood sector with villages that have switched to monoculture palm oil. Second, implementation of a comparison of livelihood transitions among villages with varying exposure to palm oil expansion. Third, the measurement of each welfare indicator is done by dividing the absolute welfare, which is used to store information about the direction of changes in welfare (increasing or decreasing) over a certain period.

These studies and other references seem to contribute equally to the widely accepted notion that increased welfare in many cases in the expansion of palm oil areas can indeed be committed to avoiding future catastrophic conflicts (e.g., [28,29]). Their empirical study announced that the indicators of indigenous welfare to the maximum absolute level will reduce the impact of resilience and further expansion of palm oil. This empirical result reinforced by Andrianto et al. [30], which shows adaptive well-being measures have the potential to reduce social management conflicts, degradation of environmental ecosystems, and significant changes in CO₂ temperature. Therefore, this research summarizes the analytical thinking of studies that use contractual indigenous welfare through palm oil land resilience as a reference scenario, as well as practical initiatives for sustainable palm oil production which emphasize that increasing indigenous welfare is very important to reduce the chain of conflict on palm oil land in the future.

1.2 Context of the palm oil cluster hierarchy study in Jambi Province

This study is located in Jambi Province, Sumatra Island, which is centered on one of the core points of palm oil expansion in Indonesia, whose line is currently being developed [31]. Geographically, the Jambi area is mostly located in the humid tropical lowlands, where the natural vegetation forest territory is a rainforest. Rainforest centers in the region have been almost half opened to access wood production and incentive smallholder cultivation [32]. This geographic gap space reveals patterns from the literature expedition Tarigan [33], which examines the distribution paths of productive land expansion such as palm oil plantations should not allow institutional steps to be carried out forest carnal observations, if this happens the accelerated destruction of tropical forests is worrying about the threat of more than some nature is experiencing a conversion catastrophe. According to Tarigan [33], the expansion of palm oil lands that cover or crowd tropical forest land, including the transformation of natural physical behavior such as high rainfall density, oxygen diffusion, minimal air capacity, volume, and faster water infiltration will have the effect of potential natural disasters, namely, floods that occur in the rainy season and droughts in the dry season.

Since the spread of palm oil land clusters in Jambi Province, the distribution of livelihoods has changed significantly and even rubber commodity farmers have changed their cultivation competition to palm oil plantations. This phenomenon is corroborated by the empirical study of Bou et al. [32], even though rubber and palm oil are commodities that require large initial investments, this means that the adoption of the change from rubber to palm oil provides substantial benefits quoted from the planting process and production results.

Therefore, it is not uncommon for farmers in Jambi to expand their agricultural land by exploring further into the forest area [34]. Uson [35] said that cultural customs of natural cycles strengthen sustainable ecosystems that must be cared for and preserved if at one point human behavior to over-exploit shows that human caring entities have not thought about the natural disasters they are facing. Considering ecosystem services as protectors and managers of human life, elements of natural biodiversity often provide maximum benefits. Regarding the empirical research of Mehraban et al. [2], then the role of the natives in Jambi has considerable hierarchical or decision-making power in dealing with all conflicts over palm oil land. Customary norms of land function in Jambi tend to be disadvantaged in terms of the impact of natural disasters caused by palm oil land use and thus loss of livelihoods is more detrimental.

2.1 Study zone and sample approach

Survey research data were collected from 300 participants who were part of the resident respondents in the palm oil plantation zone area. The sampling approach of this study records indigenous settlements in Rukam Hamlet, Taman Rajo District, Muaro Regency, Jambi Province, Indonesia. The experimental sample collection method was carried out by selecting indigenous people based on their life evolutionary experiences as seen from the perspective of livelihoods and the impact of disasters from the externality of palm oil expansion. In addition to collecting data, during our observations, this research conducted two rounds of surveys in 2019 which aimed to compare the odd and even revisions of the measurement tool. In the sampling technique, this research tried to construct two rounds of survey sequences in September on the first day (even the 4th) and the second day (the 5th odd). Several revised sample data (a total of 300 respondents two times) released substantial data updates that occurred in the panel survey during the 1 month period.

The results of the verification of the 2019 sample data measurement tool were produced using interviews, observations, and GIS mapping approaches. The interview adaptation technique aims to explore in-depth events in various indigenous activities that are not far from the palm oil delegation area regarding the hierarchy of disaster complaints consisting of land disputes, water pollution, habitat scarcity, drought/forest fires, flood disasters, and crop failure on commodity plants. As a long source and requiring accurate hierarchical quantification, this research conducted the interviews through five questionnaire techniques, namely questions with more than 1 answer, framing loss, framing loss code (odd–even), open and closed questions, and the attitude toward authority scale (AJP).

This research also adopted the visualization of the GIS observational analysis to control disaster-prone sample locations in eight hamlet centers around the palm oil area in Jambi Province, Indonesia. Samples of satellite data obtained through remote sensing systems are collected by portrait scale and distance analysis maps by considering three sets of primary data sources from geographic information from Indonesia Government (BIG/Geospatial Information Agency, BMKG/Meteorology Climatology and Geophysics Council, and BNBP/National Board for Disaster Management). Based on the GIS estimator sample, the appropriateness and availability of the amount of data for each disaster area in eight hamlets is quantified through detention test analysis or spatial detection using the GeoDa software application to demonstrate a clarified picture of disaster risk conflict maps due to the presence of transitional palm oil plantations.

1. Informed consent: Informed consent has been obtained from all individuals included in this study.

2. Ethical approval: The conducted research is not related to either human or animal use, and has been approved the ethical committee at the Faculty of Psychology, Universitas Indonesia 589/F. Psi. Komite Etik/PDP.04.00/2019.

2.2 Measurement of disaster hierarchy indicators

The hierarchical indicator measurement unit that this research prioritizes is conflict disaster variant incentives, which are a cluster of decision-making in the analysis framework for 2019. With a total order of 300 respondents to the questionnaire, our research study has the same research urgency analysis as [2], namely limiting the number of entities based on the object area of occurrence chronologically. Our study handles the ongoing conflict disaster case filtering process by improving the hierarchical sample indicator framework until the end of the observation period, building a framing scale panel of the form of geographically balanced objects that are so similar to the complexity of the length of observation in 2019, and adding controls for dividing correlation sizes hierarchies into our simulation. The indicator that this research interested in is the size of disaster conflict per year at each level of community decision in one hamlet. The evidence for this database is sourced by Darshini et al. [36], which is based on SWOT test predictions to make a comparison of challenging trade-offs between factors against multiple criteria so that the overall level of decision-making can be ascertained.

Identification of the hierarchical method of reviewing decision comparison matrix data using Expert Choice 11 or more precisely is a simulation of the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP), which estimates the ranking data distribution through comparative calculations. The AHP simulation provides all conceptual thinking of decision results and assesses hierarchical priorities to achieve large-scale decision-making under the risk of uncertainty [37]. AHP as a decision support tool has its limitations so the assumption of the degree of coefficient of the hierarchical matrix does not find a relationship between the factors of the reciprocal weighting elements. Another major concern regarding AHP, according to Nuthammachot and Stratoulias [38], is a weighting system of ranking other factors into priority decisions to be taken or considered.

On the other hand, the disaster hierarchy is only an indicator of some of the respondents’ decision opinions, and not just limited to argumentation theory on the conclusions of researchers. The multiple simulation models presented in this study reveal the simplification of broad-scale decision priorities from signaling conflicts and disasters related to palm oil expansion through integration of mitigation or assimilation of conflict customs in the indigenous environment. The clarity of decision alternative information related to the simulation of disaster priority hierarchies in the results of the AHP analysis is described in Table 1, which allows for a more precise decision-making capacity.

To identify the relevant AHP criterion measurement factors in each comparison matrix, 300 questionnaires of 5 forms of questions were distributed according to the degree of qualification of experience of the indigenous people who were directly affected to act as the most exclusive strata. The questionnaire asked respondents to think specifically about the determinants of disasters and conflicts that can promote and hinder well-being by utilizing palm oil-based indigenous lands. Conformity responses from 300 questionnaires that have been answered will be summarized into a table of indicators of the pairwise comparison matrix. By using the AHP simulation approach, the researcher evaluates the comparison of the criteria factors provided with other alternatives in the AHP category, namely domain criteria factors, supporting alternatives, and synthesis hierarchies. The development of these criteria was followed up through a series of data parameter tests according to the suitability of data collection based on hierarchical rankings on causal factors that break down all the complexities of the parties involved and tabulations of disaster conflict analysis.

While in this hierarchical test, this research deepens the distribution of objects presented through geospatial information to find the selected area or coordinates of the location each according to the hierarchy of disaster indicators. The disaster indicator areas have coordinates determined by density points to create a distribution point and are combined with spatial data on the disaster indicator area as a parameter of the transformation scheme due to the expansion of palm oil land functions, such as the surface area of the observation area, disaster-prone areas, plantation areas, and distance agglomeration of settlements. In the context of our study, it is hypothesized that the basic characteristics of indigenous land transformation represent the eight hamlets in Jambi Province, Indonesia. In using the density test through the GIS system, our study refers to the empirical concept of Azhar et al. [39], which processes software data and techniques to capture, update, and describe an overview of geographic information as shapefiles obtained in this research GIS (Figure 1).

Figure 1

Geographical information on the disaster hierarchy in the Jambi region.

3.1 Prospect of hierarchical analysis of palm oil cluster disaster in Jambi

This research took all six indicators of disaster that became conflicts within the scope of empirical research and documented and categorized the priority opinions of complaints expressed by indigenous people during interviews regarding their aspirational decisions regarding disasters due to palm oil expansion. The results of the selection of criteria and sub-criteria data were carried out by filtering disaster factors which were the initial of the conflict procedure because this conflict involved six indicator criteria data consisting of land disputes, water pollution, habitat scarcity, drought or forest fires, floods, and crop failure.

As illustrated in Figure 2, it provides a comparison of the strength of the decision hierarchy from disaster indicators which produce 18 sub-criteria regarding the affected ratio factor and 5 alternative institutional collusion conflicts around the establishment of clusters and management of palm oil production in the Jambi region. In general, the conflicts this research found involve a complex mix of hateful opinions or grievances because indigenous people want to achieve prosperity that has been usurped by corporate parties, so they start protesting against their land rights being taken without consent and will increasingly focus on environmental externalities or distribution profit.

Figure 2

Hierarchical structure of disaster indicators in the Jambi region.

Restructuring to control complaints about the impact of this disaster and determine what approach is good for indigenous people in the Jambi region? and how they voice complaints for land claims against indigenous farmers? Paradigm to identify these “controversial reports,” this research turned to our coverage documentation profile and counted the number of key identities to villagers’ grievances that were held door-to-door or emergency seminars to express their grievances. Like the hierarchy in Figure 2, this research found that the priority of the disaster indicator criteria on the land dispute sub-criteria resulted in a high degree of demonstration and hearing involving 86% of the local politicians and bureaucrats.

This kaleidoscope allegation is very interesting because it turns to the empirical approach of Marin-Burgos and Clancy [40], understanding the extent of the problem of land conflicts that have not been resolved and led to the breaking of the community welfare chain interspersed with two cases of organic protest (170 times for 150 conflicts) from attacks on assets, company property as well as petitioning the local government. While the disaster indicators in the sub-criteria for drought or forest fires, floods, and crop failure are special priority elements (involving 76% of the cases observed), the remarkable finding is that the three disaster indicators are mostly indigenous decision hierarchies as complaints of affected activities aimed at local governments rather than companies [41].

Further elaborating the hierarchy to deepen disaster indicators, some of the indigenous people interviewed underscored the relationship between the increasing difficulty of cultivating crops, the limited access to clean water for local plantations, and the pattern of communities selling plots of land to convert it into palm oil. In addition, indigenous people mentioned environmental changes, including changes in water sanitation, and referred to the loss of native forests which had an impact on the scarcity of endemic fauna which had continued to experience scarcity for many years. This research expects that the findings of the hierarchy of disaster indicators sub-criteria concur with the discussion of Rulli et al. [13], which shows that water pollution and habitat scarcity are starting to “realize” mass destruction and are driven away by abundant palm oil production activities in plantations.

Our comparison of complaints from indigenous opinion in disaster indicators illustrates a different way of involving the role of environmental contribution to determine the type of mitigation as a safeguard for socio-economic conditions in society. According to Córdoba et al. [42], the participation of institutional apparatus factors is a reason for establishing the goal of land expansion resolution, because this is the case with additional options in the five alternative AHP sub-criteria which are a direct effect sequence to find a path of improvement and peace from complaints of indigenous opinion decisions.

The consistency of the scope of analysis of our AHP study is clarified from the opinion of Nuthammachot and Stratoulias [38], which prioritizes a scale comparison matrix for each decision-level sample assessment criterion to divide the ranking of criteria that affect the main objectives of determining the hierarchy. Six disaster indicator criteria are presented to test the paired matrix on the structured AHP weight results from land disputes (criterion 1), water pollution (criterion 2), habitat scarcity (criterion 3), drought/forest fires (criterion 4), floods (criterion 5), and crop failure (criterion 6) (Figure 3). The ranking of the AHP cluster includes 18 alternative disaster conflicts and the involvement of 5 types of stakeholders obtained in the disaster hierarchy analysis.

Figure 3

Pairwise comparison matrix in the disaster indicator hierarchy. Source: Expert Choice 11.

The strength of the disaster hierarchy score in the form of land disputes in the Jambi hamlet area played the most significant criterion role in shaping the perception of indigenous complaint decisions (aggregate priority of complaints of 36.6%), followed by the drought/forest fire criteria score categories (20.1%), flooding (13%), and crop failure (11.8%). Throughout recording complaint documentation, this research rarely find the importance of two disaster priorities which are also experienced by some of their problems, so the replication of criterion data including water pollution (10.6%) and habitat scarcity (8%) is a weak score for an overview disaster hierarchy in Jambi Province.

In contrast, the stakeholder group that became the highest alternative decision target was the contribution of the local government (26.1%), which is fully committed to emphasizing solutions to solving disaster conflict networks among indigenous people and palm oil founders. Turning attention to the analysis of the AHP hierarchy, the development of disaster indicators due to the impact of palm oil must be observed that there are factors that receive supporting priority content in each of the four AHP categories in stakeholder institutions that overlap between companies (24.4%), indigenous people (21%), central government (14.4%), and NGO organizations (14.2%).

As reported by the findings of Li et al. [29], the expansion of palm oil production poses challenges for policymakers and industries in various countries that aim to diversify the portfolio of available suppliers of raw material sources. Following the order that was previously reported by Dompreh et al. [43], combining decision perceptions for submitting complaints to stakeholder institutions is the main license in optimizing national and global transformation strategies (especially applied as a study of conflict resolution plans). The literature review and the findings of this study indicate that the local government has been concerned with indigenous people in Jambi for organizing their excessive dependence on conventional palm oil lands, which has shown a significant increase in conflict and disaster.

The main focus of written basic law sources on stakeholder programs related to the expansion of palm oil land is diversification and environmental capital security rather than a direct commitment to preventing energy disparities [44]. Ideally, commodity expansion contract development projects need to consider the potential for reducing conflict appetites and mitigating habitat damage for the sustainability of natural ecosystem superpowers [45]. In addition to looking at ecological assumptions, the importance of investing in long-term infrastructure development such as cables, connecting networks, and roads is a progressive contribution from expansion policies, because the conversion of palm oil lands is mostly focused on the impact of indigenous welfare in remote areas [46].

3.2 Validation of disaster conflict detection points

Most of the conditions of the indigenous areas in Jambi have a tropical equatorial climate and half of the topography of the weather or climate is located in the rainy season [5]. The difference between the two advantages of these types of geographic landscapes is that the area in Jambi has stages of suitability for companies in validating the establishment of palm oil plantations [34]. Therefore, our study analyzes natural factors in the expansion of the palm oil planting area which affect the detection point of disaster conflicts in Jambi Province. In addition, this research found a detection point that the area of expansion increased causing native activities to decrease and the livelihoods that the natives earned were scarce so it was not uncommon for residents to turn to palm oil workers to meet their needs.

This speculation explores the study of Rahmani et al. [47] that the expansion of palm oil plantations not only brings about natural convergence factors but also diversification of indigenous welfare in eight Rukam hamlets, Taman Rajo District, Muaro Regency, Jambi. Seeing this symposium, this research examined changes in primary palm oil land cover which were relatively detectable in GIS density test images using natural colors with manual explanation (Figure 4). It can be seen that the difference in the color of the pixels that are greener is the percentage of distribution of palm oil planting areas, while the combined colorful pattern is designated as a contaminated area for disaster conflict events in Rukam Hamlet, Taman Rajo District, Muaro Regency, Jambi Province.

Figure 4

Detection points for palm oil plantations and disaster-prone areas in eight hamlets of Jambi Province. Source: Lansat GIS Indonesia.

This process of land transformation implies that the boom in palm oil expansion not only drags on converted forest land, but also local indigenous elites feel “colonized” in the sense of their welfare. This article argues that isolated lands are a key driver of land rights transitions whereby areas are transferred by well-managed companies to facilitate palm oil plantation chains. This finding is different from that of Teng et al. [48], who observed that companies will maximize profit from palm oil production in the long term by increasing production land and marginal workers. Native land in peat areas is more likely to be used as access to opening up common land resources where land shifts are uncontrolled and are used continuously [49]. The 2019 clarification map is included as a data visualization of the dynamics of disaster conflict risk landscapes and is compiled based on the intensity of how big the ratio of events to six disaster factors is related to land disputes, water pollution, habitat scarcity, drought/forest fires, floods, and crop failure. The six disaster risk classes are defined for each color detection from the layer section which consists of undetectable, very low, low, medium, high, and very high (Figure 5).

Figure 5

Map distribution of land ownership and risks disaster conflict in the Rokan sub-village, Jambi Province, Indonesia. Source: Geoda & ESRI ArcGIS.

Map data on the distribution of land owned by palm oil plantations in Jambi hamlet conclude a significance value of the probability of 0.05 (5%) having a wide range of natural forest (162 ha/3.62%), state plantation land (900 ha/53.37%), native plantation land (457 ha/15.24%), and private plantation land (1,789 ha/67.3%). Then, this distribution clarification map is overlaid on the colors of the disaster conflict risk zones and the result is that there are six hamlet points in Jambi which are recorded in the very high and high-risk zones and the rest are in the medium zone (Figure 5).

The main cause is the expansion of palm oil lands that are not conditioned such as burning protected forests and polluting indigenous commodity land self-help [50]. According to Raharja et al. [51], the central and regional governments in the Jambi region do not yet have the right view to stop the quality of conflicts between companies and residents, because these conflicts are always based on failures due to the factor of “bribes” provided by the state and the private sector in a company. This research believes that the welfare position of the small natives is still underrepresented compared to other stakeholders such as local elites. They have to deal with the company’s palm oil expansion activities when the land bonding process still uses old cultural methods, such as burning forests, polluting river water, and a culture of exploitation. The point of view of another phenomenon is that the local elite as the highest strata of society benefits from the easy sale of some native land to finance regional operations, even though if traced they are worried about the future socio-economic welfare of the natives [52].

Given this situation, both central and local governments play important roles in distributing indigenous welfare through devolution of the management of palm oil land expansion and definitions regarding land ownership boundaries to avoid conflict over land dispute lines [53]. Indigenous land justice will begin to be coordinated if it is clear that it is empowered and this research agrees with Schoneveld et al. [54] if native welfare conditions have the freedom to developing institutions to protect land rights based on their rules and knowledge. One of the empowerment that can be implemented to indigenous people is capacity building. On the environmental aspects, capacity building has urgencies to be implemented on tackling deforestation issues [55,56]. Also, capacity building as form of empowerment can be a solution by supporting smallholders on sustainable agriculture and acknowledge the presence of indigenous people as “ecological heroes” [57].