Why Evict Farmers Amid Food Crisis Says Psm Chief

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Dr Jeyakumar Devaraj with farmers from Changkat Kinding preparing to submit a memorandum to the Perak menteri besar in May. (Sosialist.net pic)GEORGE TOWN: The move to clear out farmers from Perak’s valleys producing the most vegetables in the state and probably in the country has been decried by an activist, saying it was unfortunate as the nation faced a shortage of food.
Parti Sosialis Malaysia chief Dr Jeyakumar Devaraj said the affected farmers in Perak have been contributing to the state’s food security for decades even before Merdeka.
The Perak government is evicting farmers who were occupying land which did not belong to them and offered them hill land as a replacement which was refused as the farmers say it was not suitable.
Jeyakumar said these farmers began farming in the colonial period and have never faced eviction since, and carried on, at the urging of the government.
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He said the Razak Hussein government in the 1970s encouraged people to farm on any vacant land as part of the Green Book Plan to boost the food supply in the nation.
“The land office was directed to help farmers to farm on empty land. Now we have accusations that these farmers are not landowners and are trespassers, which we think is nonsense,” he told FMT.
Jeyakumar said vegetable farming occupies only 5% of the eight million hectares of agricultural land.
Only 700,000 hectares were used for padi, while 800,000 hectares were for other vegetable crops, including pepper, cocoa, coconut and freshwater fish farming. The bulk of agricultural land – 80% or 5.5 million hectares – is used for oil palm.
“But yet, we have developers and state governments eating into this 5% of precious land. The issue here is not about farmers, it is the state of our food security of our country. If land grabs keep happening, how will we reach the capacity to produce vegetables for ourselves?” he said.
Jeyakumar said the government should provide leases of 10 to 20 years for small farmers, with a condition that it is cancelled and given to others if the land is not cultivated for at least two years.
“There should be a check and balance mechanism to ensure that poor farmers are not unjustly kicked out,” he said.
The demand for vegetables has grown by 20% in 2020 compared to 2010 with consumption of vegetables at 65.1kg per capita in 2020 compared to 54.7kg in 2010, according to government statistics.
However, rice consumption dropped by 4% to 76.5kg per capita two years ago, while fruit consumption dropped by 17% to 78kg.
The Kinta district, where Chemor is located, produced the most significant amount of vegetables in Perak, amounting to nearly 95,000 metric tonnes with a value of almost RM200 million in 2019.
Universiti Putra Malaysia lecturer M Nasir Shamsudin said the federal government should give incentives for states to allocate land for vegetable or food production, computed from a certain percentage of the value of vegetables or food production by the state. - FMT

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