Irrigation Infrastructure Prone to Climate Change, Catastrophes

The Jakarta Post

28 November 2014

Jonatan A. Lassa

President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo is looking forward to reaping some low-hanging fruit in the first two years of his presidency. In order to do this in food and agricultural production, he has been stressing the fact that more than half of Indonesian irrigation infrastructure is either damaged or in very poor condition.

However, with a changing climate and recurrent hazards such as floods affecting most of the already vulnerable irrigation infrastructure, there is a danger of underestimating the need for careful and deliberative planning.

What is lacking from Jokowi is an explanation as to how his Cabinet will address the natural hazards such as floods and earthquakes to which most of the Indonesian irrigation infrastructure is vulnerable.

…The writer is a research fellow at the Center for Non-Traditional Security Studies, the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore.

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