Changing realities: perspectives on Balinese rice cultivation

This paper discusses issues of agrarian change in south-central Bali. The proximity to urban areas, especially the tourist centers along the southern coast, provides, any off-farm employment opportunities for small scale farming households. Although rice farming continues, for many households it has become a side business. The flexible nature of rice farming in terms of labour input and available casual off-farm work allows farming households to allocate their available labor to a variety of on-farm and off-farm income generating activities. The subak which unites farmers in the irrigation and cultivation of the rice crop plays an important role in supporting this flexibility. Still, the future of rice farming and the organisation behind looks rather dim with an unwilling younger generation to work in the “mud” and little appreciation of the many benefits subak provides not only to the farming but the wider community