Factors affecting the adoption of sustainable upland agriculture at Lawu Mountain, Indonesia

• Main Author: Karyanto, Puguh
• Format: Thesis
• Language: English; English
• Published: 2010
• Subjects: S Agriculture (General)
• Online Access: http://etd.uum.edu.my/2366/1/s90805.pdf; http://etd.uum.edu.my/2366/2/s90805_abstract.pdf; http://etd.uum.edu.my/2366/; http://lintas.uum.edu.my:8080/elmu/index.jsp?module=webopac-l&action=fullDisplayRetriever.jsp&szMaterialNo=0000761695
• Institution: Universiti Utara Malaysia

Sustainability in upland agriculture has faced a great challenge since a balance must be sought between environmental protection and economic orientation. Towards sustainable upland agriculture, stakeholders must perform particular strategies that address the economic orientation of the agriculture without compromising the upland conservation efforts to maintain the critical ecological properties of the upland. At the study site, organic farming and some other forms of environmentally friendly agriculture has been promoted as strategies that are in line with the idea of sustainable upland agriculture. However, despite the promotion of these green strategies, the upland farmers at the study site are still suffered from adopting these sustainable agricultural practices. This case shows that the diffusion of sustainable upland agriculture has faced many obstacles. Yet, this research is aimed to observe factors behind the poor diffusion of sustainable upland agriculture. Framework for assessing linkage between capacity/incentive and natural resource degradation and the Driving Force-Pressure-State-Impact-Response Framework (DPSIR) were used in combination in this research. The capacity was translated into five types of livelihood asset i.e. social, human, financial, natural and physical capital. The incentive was translated into the governmental incentive and market signal. Both the capacity and incentive were proposed as predictors for the extent of adoption of sustainable upland agriculture. Stratified random sampling was the sampling technique used in this research. The data was collected by applying questionnaire upon 408 farmers. By using SPSS released 16.5, the obtained data was analyzed by the multiple-linear regression analyses. The obtained R square from the regression analysis is 0.649 with the F statistic less than 0.05. The regression model did a good job in explaining relationship between the proposed predictors and the independent variable. All predictors except the market signal are significantly associated with the dependent variable. According to the value of the beta standardized coefficient, the Incentive is the major predictor in affecting the diffusion and adoption of sustainable upland agriculture. Ensuring the profitability of performing sustainable upland agriculture by building good market channel, providing credit and, allocating subsidy for the organic input are considered as critical. Buildings strong human capital in agriculture by providing assistances, trainings and guidance are also become one of important actions to improve the upland farmers' confident to adopt sustainable upland agriculture.