CC BY
57
УДК 332:528.4 Eko W. Wisudawanto
Division of Ionosphere and Telecommunication, National Institute of Aeronautics and Space Rizqi Abdulharis
Surveying and Cadastre Research Division, Faculty of Earth Science and Technology, Bandung Institute of Technology, Indonesia
INTERPRETING CUSTOMARY AREA OF SEMI-NOMADEN INDIGENOUS COMMUNITY: THE CASE OF INDIGENOUS COMMUNITY OF SOUTHERN BANTEN, INDONESIA
Customary land arrangement has become the backbone of sustainable development for centuries. Unfortunately, unprotected state of customary land tenure, both legally and technically, in several areas in Indonesia has almost diminished the advantages of customary land management practice to almost none. Thus, there is a need on empowerment of customary land arrangement in Indonesia.
Since 2007, there has been an effort on empowerment of customary land arrangement in Indonesia. This effort was initiated by identification of customary land tenure systems that are still effectively practiced at this moment. This paper highlights initial study on empowerment of customary land arrangement in West Java and Banten, in particular on defining customary area of indigenous community of Southern Banten. Clarity of customary area, both from legal and technical point of view, is of important step of this study in order to allow customary land arrangement to be performed effectively. Moreover, case study of Southern Banten represents (semi-)nomadic communal customary land tenure type, which in fact is not commonly subsisted in Java Island, considering its function as economic development centre in the last three decades, as well as in other areas throughout the world.
Procedure on finding customary area of people of Southern Banten could be further employed on identification of customary area of semi-nomadic indigenous community. This is due to the slight difference between claim of the former leader of this people on its area, which is 70,000 Ha, and calculated extent of this customary area in this research, which is 68,000 Ha. However, this study shows that identification of customary area of semi-nomadic indigenous community could only be applied partially on identification of customary area of nomadic indigenous community.
Keywords: Area, Banten, Custom, Indigenous Community, Indonesia and Semi-Nomaden
1. INTRODUCTION
Customary land arrangement has become the backbone of sustainable development for centuries. Particularly in Indonesia, indigenous communities of Southern Banten and Yogyakarta, in which instituted as Sultanate of Ngayogyakarta Hadiningrat, has been able to balance their economic development with environmental and socio-cultural value preservation. According to Abdulharis (2008), customary land arrangement in the area claimed as customary area of indigenous community of Southern Banten has lead to food resilience, continuation of supremacy of custom and natural resource preservation within area in question. Moreover, besides maintaining supremacy of Sultanate of Ngayogyakarta Hadiningrat and environmental preservation, customary land arrangement of city of Yogyakarta has managed its customary land to become an engine of prosperity (Abdulharis et al., 2008).
Unfortunately, unprotected state of customary land tenure, both legally and technically, in several areas in Indonesia has almost diminished the advantages of customary land management practice to almost none. This is due to the establishment of formal land tenure system of Indonesia dated from 1960, which lead to land tenure regime dualism in Indonesia. It is stated in Act of Republic of Indonesia no. 5 year 1960, known as Basic Agrarian Law, that custom is indeed the basis of promulgation of formal land tenure system of Indonesia. However, in practice, there is no means of protection for allowing customary land tenure system to be effectively performed. Legal status of customary land is clearly indistinct, allowing the land to be squatted by the haves and those who are in power.
Since 2007, there has been an effort on empowerment of customary land arrangement in Indonesia. This effort was initiated by identification of customary land tenure systems that are still effectively practiced at this moment. Considering that there are at least four types of customary land tenures in Indonesia, which are settled communal, nomadic communal, aristocratic and private customary land tenure, there are five case studies chosen that represent the above types of customary land arrangement. The case studies were and will be performed at West Java and Banten, Bali, Yogyakarta, West Sumatera and the heart of Kalimantan. Models on empowerment of customary land arrangement acquired from these case studies could then be employed, possibly with fundamental customisation, on other customary areas, each area will employ the model of the same customary land tenure type.
This paper highlights initial study on empowerment of customary land arrangement in West Java and Banten, in particular on defining customary area of indigenous community of Southern Banten. Clarity of customary area, both from legal and technical point of view, is of important step of this study in order to allow customary land arrangement to be performed effectively. Moreover, case study of Southern Banten represents (semi-)nomadic communal customary land tenure type, which in fact is not commonly subsisted in Java Island, considering its function as economic development centre in the last three decades, as well as in other areas throughout the world.
In this paper, identification of customary area of indigenous community of Southern Banten is initiated by short description on this indigenous community’s civilisation related to its customary area. This short introduction is followed by procedure to identify the customary area of semi-nomadic indigenous community of Southern Banten. Finally, concluding remarks and further steps on empowerment of customary land arrangement are described.
2. BRIEF FACTS
Indigenous community of Southern Banten, known as Kesatuan Adat Banten Kidul in Bahasa Indonesia or Union of Customary Community of Southern Banten, was initially established on 7th century (Wisudawanto, 2008). Differing from most indigenous communities in Java Island, this community has been living semi-nomadically since its establishment. The ancestor of this community was at first lived in Lebak Parang in Municipality of Bogor, Province of West Java. The
supernatural vision of customary leaders of this community, in which believed to be the visions of their ancestors that came up through many kinds of medias such as dream, have made this community relocate its customary community centre. It has been identified that the customary community centre has been relocated 10 times. The last time this community relocates its customary community centre was on 2002, when the late customary leader, Encup Sucipta, relocated the centre of activity of this community from Ciptarasa to Ciptagelar. See Figure 1 and Figure 2 for recent customary community centre at Ciptagelar.
Figure 1: View of customary activity centre of Ciptagelar from its northern part
Since 1902, its semi-nomadic way of life brought this community to area that is recently known as jurisdiction of National Park of Mount Halimun and Salak. Considering that this area was highly forested area, people of this community had to open up the land for their living. The land clearing was carried out up to 1942. Since then, leader of this community at that time decided that it was not possible anymore to deforest the forest in order to maintain balance between this community’s civilisation enhancement and natural resources preservation.
Standpoint of this community on sustainable development is still colouring its custom to date. In order to ensure environmental preservation in that particular area, there classified three types of forest, which are forbidden forest (leuweung tutupan in Bahasa Sunda, official language of this community), entrusted forest (leuweung titipan) and production forest (leuweung garapan). Each type of forest holds different function. Forbidden forest is functioning as conservation area and there is no activity allowed, without any exception, to be performed in this area. Entrusted forest holds same function as forbidden forest, except it is possible to extract natural resources of this type of forest for custom needs only. In production forest, anyone, both member and non-member of this customary community, is
allowed to take benefit from this type of forest but is obliged to reforest area within this community’s customary area at the same level of deforestation occurred in production forest. There existed four other types of conservation area, in which scales are smaller than forbidden and entrusted forest. These conservation areas are sirah cai (spring), pamatang (a pile of soil), lemah gunting (a joint of two or more stream) and some other specific places that are believed to be haunted. Furthermore, in the governance period of the late customary leader Encup Sucipta, there have been efforts on ensuring sustainability to be maintained in this area, such as by planting 16.000 trees in this community’s customary area and establishing man-made pounds for water conservation.
Figure 2: View of customary activity centre of Ciptagelar from its western part
Custom in this area is still obeyed by people of this indigenous community. One of the important attributes of law is the attribute of sanction. In this community’s customary law, the form of sanction is more to social sanctions, such as seclusion from community activities. Even though there is no physical punishment for those whom violated custom, people are respecting their custom and decision of their leader as they believe that it will lead to an unfortunate life, a sanction that will be effective for their entire life.
Besides the recent customary activity centre, Ciptagelar, and other 10 former centres, there are approximately 560 villages associated to this customary community. These villages are mostly located within area that was cleared out between 1902 and 1942, and few others are located outside area of National Park of Mount Halimun and Salak.
3. DEFINING CUSTOMARY AREA
Defining customary area of semi-nomadic indigenous community is different question with it of settled or aristocratic customary community. First of all, settled and aristocratic customary area are fixed into some extent, while, in semi- and nomadic indigenous people, relocation of its customary activity centre could mostly broaden extent of customary area. In most nomadic customary community, abandoned areas, as well as areas that will be occupied in the future, are considered as their belonging. Secondly, boundary of most customary areas is classified in general boundary type due to its nature to imprecisely define boundary by natural objects such as forest, stream and so forth. In land administration concept, physical boundary is directly linked to legal boundary, in which describes rights, restrictions and obligations of land parcel’s owner regarding land parcel in question. Considering uncertainty of boundary of area of semi- and nomadic customary indigenous community, this creates higher level of complexity on defining extent of customary area. This in return leads to uncertainty of status of relation between customary community and its quarter from legal point of view.
In order to break down the complexity on defining customary area of semi-nomadic indigenous community of Southern Banten, this section is divided into three parts. The first part of this section describes factors influencing formation of customary area in Southern Banten (Section 3.1). Section 3.2 identifies physical evidences of boundary of customary area of people of Southern Banten, while Section 3.3 depicts the customary area of indigenous people of Southern Banten.
3.1 Factors Influencing Formation of Customary Area
Based on description of customary people of Southern Banten in Section 2, there are several factors influenced the forming of customary area in area in question. These factors are movement pattern of customary activity centre, spatial pattern of customary villages and location of forestry areas. Movement pattern is of most important factor as it directly influences land clearing and, further, the other two factors and the extent of customary area itself. Having relocated its customary activity centre 10 times within more than 1,300 years, these activity centres have encouraged establishment of villages, either customary or non-customary ones, in activity centres’ surrounding areas. This in return connects the enlargement of extent of customary area with the movement pattern of customary activity centre. There are at least 560 customary villages in customary area of indigenous community of Southern Banten. Furthermore, considering the custom that forbids its people to open up land since 1942, forestry areas are bordering the customary area. See Figure 3 for jurisdiction of National Park of Mount Halimun and Salak and Figure 4 for distribution of identified customary villages of people of Southern Banten.
3.2.Physical Evidences of Boundary of Customary Area
Even though this indigenous community’s area could be classified as in general boundary type, there are objects that were placed to represent boundary of customary area of this community. These objects were basically put in place not for marking the customary area of people of Southern Banten but they were believed to be the means of protection from external interventions, both natural and supernatural ones. Objects that could be categorised as customary area marks are
Cordyline sp, Mascarena lagenicaulis and statues. There are also man-made objects that are considered as marks for bounding areas with general boundary type, such as dirt tracks and dikes. See Figure 5 for identified objects marked customary area of people of Southern Banten.
Unfortunately, most boundary lines are not marked at all. The only evidence is the information from the customary community itself. Although the boundary is not clearly marked, there was a successful effort on 1973 from Indonesian Forestry Office to measure the boundary and extent of customary area of this indigenous people. Extent of customary area of customary community of Southern Banten was 70,000 Ha.
MAP OF NATIONAL PARK OF MOUNT HALIMUN - SALAK
Figure 3: Map of National Park of Mount Halimun and Salak
3.3 Customary Area of Indigenous Community of Southern Banten Having identified factors influencing the formation of customary area of people of Southern Banten, as well as physical marks of customary area boundary, the area of indigenous community of Southern Banten then could be defined. Even though there is limitation on identification of 560 customary villages, as well as absence of most customary area’s boundary physical marks, the extent of calculated area in this research is insignificantly differed from claim of this customary community, which is approximately reached 68,000 Ha. See Figure 6 for customary area of indigenous community of Southern Banten measured in this research.
4. DISCUSSION
4.1 Conclusion
Even though there is a limitation on identifying 560 customary villages and an absence of most physical marks of boundary of this community’s customary area, procedure on finding customary area of people of Southern Banten could be further
employed on identification of customary area of semi-nomadic indigenous community. This is due to the slight difference between claim of the former leader of this people on its area, which is 70,000 Ha, and calculated extent of this customary area in this research, which is 68,000 Ha.
In the end, this study shows that identification of customary area of semi-nomadic indigenous community could only be applied partially on identification of customary area of nomadic indigenous community. This is due to the fact that since 1942 it was not allowed to open up the land, while characteristic of movement of nomadic indigenous community could be more complicated than it of customary people of Southern Banten. Thus, semi-nomadic communal customary land tenure should be considered as another type of customary land tenure in Indonesia. Moreover, separate model thus should be established to model the empowerment of customary land arrangement of semi-nomadic indigenous community rather than adopting this model for modelling the empowerment of customary land arrangement of nomadic indigenous community.
Furthermore, applying general boundary principle on defining customary area of (semi-)nomadic indigenous people is not in accordance with main principle of land arrangement in Indonesia, in which adopts fixed boundary principle. This will in return lead to inconsistency of boundary of customary area, particularly considering flexibility of extent of customary area.
4.2 Recommendation
Even though there is only a slight difference between area calculated in this research and claim from the former leader of indigenous community of Southern Banten, identification of all 560 customary villages, as well as identification of boundary of this customary area both marked and unmarked, should further be performed in order to acquire an accurate calculation of extent of customary area of this customary community. Having had the procedure on defining customary area of semi-nomadic indigenous community, further step on empowerment of customary land arrangement is to define legal status of customary area and its arrangement itself.
Moreover, it is recommended to employ topological boundary principle to replace utilisation of general boundary principle on defining customary area of (semi-)nomadic indigenous community. By applying former principle, identification of boundary of customary area could be broken down by just identifying coordinates of marked and unmarked boundary. This will further facilitate flexibility of customary area depicted from customary land arrangement of (semi-)nomadic indigenous community.
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Figure 4: Distribution of identified customary villages
Figure 5: Objects identified as markers of customary areas: (a) Cordyline sp; (b) fence; (c) edge of cropland; (d) edge of dwelling’s yard; (e) dike
Figure 6: Customary area of people of Southern Banten identified in this research
References
1. Abdulharis, R., 2008, Customary Land Tenure for Sustainable Development: the Case of Indonesia, in: Proceeding of 6th Taipei International Digital Earth Symposium, Taipei, 15-16 May (in press)
2. Abdulharis, R., Sarah, K., Hendriatiningsih, S., Hernandi, A. And Zevenbergen, J., 2008, The Customary Land Tenure toward the Sustainable City Development: the Case Study of Yogyakarta, Indonesia, in: Proceeding of FIG Commission 3 Annual Meeting and Workshop on Spatial Information Management toward Environmental Management of Mega Cities, Valencia, 1821 February.
3. Wisudawanto, E. W., 2008, Method and Arrangement of Delineation of Customary Area based on Customary Law: Case Study of Kasepuhan Ciptagelar, B.Eng. thesis, Bandung Institute of Technology, Bandung
Biographical Notes
1. Eko W. Wisudawanto
- Academic Background: B.Eng on Geodesy and Geomatics Engineering from Bandung Institute of Technology
- Current Employment: Assistant on Ionosphere and Telecommunication, National Institute of Aeronautics and Space, Bandung, Indonesia
- Research Interest: Customary land tenure and remote sensing
2. Rizqi Abdulharis
- Academic Background: B.Eng on Geodesy and Geomatics Engineering from Bandung Institute of Technology and M.Sc on Geomatics from Delft University of Technology;
- Current Employment: Academic Assistant at Surveying and Cadastre Research Division, Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Institute of Technology of Bandung;
- Research Interest: Land administration in particular on customary land tenure, geographic information science, spatial data infrastructure and disaster management.
© Eko W. Wisudawanto, Rizqi Abdulharis ,2008
