The impacts and opportunities of salcra plantation to the landowner's socio-economic and labour supply : a case study of salcra estates in Saratok district

Plantation agriculture remains an important sector of the Malaysian economy. However, it faces problems of labour supply especially from the local population, which led to the recruitment of foreign labourers. This study, therefore attempts to assess the degree of local labour participation in the plantation sector based on the case study of landowners who participated in Sarawak Land Consolidation And Rehabilitation Authority’s (SALCRA) plantations at Roban-South and Saratok Oil Palm Estate in the Saratok District, Sarawak. The specific objectives are to determine participants’ demographic characteristics; to examine how agro-economic diversification, festive and cultural activities, and various forms of non-farm employment influence the labour supply in the estates; to assess the attitude of the participants’ participation towards the project, the regimented working style and foreign workers – “Tenaga Kerja Indonesia” (TKI); and to evaluate the level of participants’ participation on the implementation of the project, such as engaging as a small time contractors. Data for the study were collected mainly through face-to-face interview using an interview schedule to 74 respondents. The study revealed that 39.19 percent of the respondents or landowners’ household supply labour to the plantations. Landowners’ labour participation in SALCRA plantations is influenced by the household size and land participating in SALCRA’s plantations. Larger household has positive relationship with labour supply, i.e. the larger the household the more they would supply labour. On the other hand, the size of land involved in the plantations has a negative relationship with labour supply, which mean the bigger the size of land surrendered for SALCRA plantations, the less they would supply labour to the plantations. It was also found that landowners are not solely dependent on SALCRA for employment. The labour issue in SALCRA is not due to number, but how regular the local people would turn-up to work. A two-stage cluster random sampling was used to select the respondents. As the sample of the study is small and confined to only two estates, its significance is only to provide an insight understanding of local labour supply characteristics of the Roban-South and Saratok estates and cannot be taken to reflect the whole of SALCRA. To understand the whole picture of local labour supply characteristics in SALCRA a further study with expanded sample and wider coverage is needed