Kornas Gempita: Acceleration Of IP400 Must Be Supported With Alsintan

Illustration (Photo: Doc. Antara)

The National Coordinator of the Indonesian farmer youth movement (Kornas Gempita) said that the acceleration of the 400 (IP400) planting index in the regions must be supported by agricultural tools and machinery so that the program's goals can be achieved by the target of four planting times a year.

"The government applies this pattern as an effort to increase production, in order to achieve that goal it needs to be aimed at adequate facilities and infrastructure," Adi Herndiyus said as quoted by ANTARA, Sunday, December 24.

According to him, strengthening the planting index is important in order to increase national rice production capacity and productivity, which is four times planting and harvesting in a year as an effort to optimize domestic agricultural potential.

This planting pattern indirectly also affects the habits of farmers, who previously planted three times a year, are now boosted more optimally with the hope that agricultural production will get better.

"IP400 is one of the breakthroughs of the Ministry of Agriculture (Kementan) in advancing this sector so that it can compete with other food producing countries. Gempita as one of the government partners is trying to help farmers in implementing this method," he said.

He assessed that Parigi Moutong, one of the regions in Central Sulawesi, helped maintain food security locally, regionally and national food security.

Because this district is one of the agricultural-producing regions, it is necessary to develop the sustainability of this sector.

"It is time for youth to take part in developing agriculture through various research results to be applied in the field. Farmers are at the forefront of maintaining domestic food sovereignty, so we are part of agriculture to participate in advancing this sector," said Adi.

According to data from the Parigi Moutong Food Crops and Plantation Service (TPHP) in 2023, the district's rice planting area reaches 68,793 hectares with a harvest area of 59,161.5 hectares and an average productivity of 47.5 quintals/hectares producing 239,538.5 tons of harvested dry unhulled rice (GKP).

"I received information that Parigi Moutong is one of the rice center areas, and it can be seen that with the amount of grain production reaching hundreds of thousands of tons, I hope that the Regional Government (Pemda) will provide maximum support to local farmers. Apart from the availability of alsintan, there is also a need for the availability of certified seeds so that their products produce quality," he said.