Perbandingan persepsi masyarakat terhadap hutan rakyat berbasis karet dan kebun kelapa sawit

Abstract

Palm oil as one of Indonesian main export commodities shows rising trend and presumed affecting the societies of various regions in using land. Oil palm plantation furthermore became the main competitor for traditional farming systems, such as rubber community forest in Sumatera. Sipaho administratively located in Padang Lawas Utara District, which is an agricultural area of rubber production centers in North Sumatra. Rubber plantations in this region owned by community and developed extensively, mostly in agroforestry system. This research aims to analyse and compare Sipaho society perception to rubber community forest and oil palm plantation, and identify its influencing factors. Moreover, it also assessed the contributions of both plantation types to household income. Data were obtained through literature studies and interviews with 62 respondents that represent rubber farmers, rubber and palm oil farmers, and non farmers. Intake of respondents used purposive sampling method. Study result shows that respondents have medium perception on medium to socioeconomic, ecology, and socioculture aspects of rubber community forest as well as oil palm. Perception to rubber community forest were influenced by schooling period, land ownership, and income, while the perception to oil palm plantation correlated with age. Regarding to economic aspect rubber community forest and oil palm plantation contributed 47% and 43% on household income from agricultural sector.