“Increasing the padi price or giving production incentives to farmers is a must,” he said. This, he said, would put further pressure on the food security situation as Sarawak would then depend even more on imported rice. “If this situation continues, Sarawak’s padi cultivation area will decrease even more.” Padi plants stand in neat rows at a field in Kampung Skuduk, where only a handful of farmers remain in the rice production business.
“Some farmers have already shifted to oil palm or pineapple cultivation which is more profitable,” he said. Speaking to MalaysiaNow, Stephen who holds the modernisation of agriculture and regional development portfolio said the current padi price was far too low. Sarawak minister Stephen Rundi Anak Utom said one way to tackle the issue is to increase the price of padi. In 2012, there were about 130,000 hectares of padi land in the state. Some parcels of land are even rented out to businesses instead. “They would rather work in the factories near the city.”Īs the years go by, more and more of the land once set aside for padi is converted to fields for other crops. “The young people have no interest in growing padi because it’s tiring,” Silbey said. Part of the problem is that those from the younger generation prefer working in urban areas instead of returning to their villages to spend their days on the farm. Meanwhile, the once-flourishing padi fields languish. These, they sell to wholesalers in the capital city of Kuching. They also grow vegetables such as cucumbers, pumpkins and pepper.
“The young people have no interest in growing padi.”Īt Kampung Skuduk, the villagers have moved on to planting rubber instead under another government scheme. While they have machines to help them during harvest season, these do not always make their lives easier. Labour costs have also been on the rise, and many farmers feel that the long cultivation process is no longer worth their time. Village head Silbey Anak Nobek said the income from padi crops had not been encouraging in recent years. Most of the villagers have moved on to cultivating other, more lucrative, crops like rubber. Today, though, the plots which were once green with young plants are abandoned and overgrown with weeds. At Kampung Skuduk in Serian, farmers used to head out at dawn to spend the day working in their padi fields.įor decades, it was one of the few villages in Sarawak which cultivated wet padi or padi paya – padi grown in irrigated fields.
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