Golf courses, developers nibble at Asia's rice paddies

By Sara Webb

TANAH LOT, Indonesia (Reuters) - The tourists who tee off at this golf course on Bali's west coast are probably unaware that the ground beneath their feet is connected to a global panic over rice supplies.

Once this golf course was a patchwork of rice fields. Now just a few remain, and villagers work as caddies or waiters at Le Meridien Nirwana resort and its Greg Norman-designed greens.

From Bali to Vietnam, rice paddies are being replaced by golf courses, hotels, villas and industrial parks as Asian economies surge ahead, the standard of living rises and locals opt for higher-paying, less labor-intensive work away from farming.

This shift has cut into rice production, a staple food throughout much of the region.

A recent surge in rice prices to historic highs has sparked fears of political unrest in some parts of Asia and highlighted the dilemma faced by Asian governments about how to balance economic growth with food security in the future.

"The call from Malaysia to Indonesia to China is 'return to the land and be a farmer again'," said Song Seng Wun, regional economist at CIMB-GK Research in Singapore.

"The lesson is, food security is important, but people have forgotten that in their rush to industrialise. Longer term, they have to focus on the fact that all these people have to be fed."

In Bali, hotels and other property projects are nibbling away at the picture-postcard rice paddy terraces. Total harvested area for rice, which peaked at nearly 182,000 hectares in 1980, has fallen to 145,000 hectares, the agriculture ministry says.

"I don't want any more villas here because if all the land is used for villas, there won't be enough for rice," said I Ketut Cuet, who farms rice on the outskirts of Ubud, in Bali.

YOUTH SEE NO FUTURE IN FARMING

Stunning rice paddy views are a part of Bali's appeal as a tourist destination. Last year, foreign tourists contributed about $5.3 billion to Indonesia's economy, with Bali attracting the lion's share, or about 40 percent, of all visitors to the country.

But with tourism forming one of the main economic drivers on this Indonesian island, many Balinese are abandoning the back-breaking work for better-paid, easier jobs. Some Balinese farmers now prefer to hire cheaper labour from the neighbouring island of Java to work in their rice fields.

The change is not surprising. Rice farmers spend long hours standing in muddy water, bent double as they plant, tend or harvest their crops.

"Farming is not a good life. You work hard and make a low profit compared with other jobs, for example in tourism," said Wayan Sugita, a farmer in Canggu, western Bali, who has worked in his family's rice fields all his life.

He fears that when he grows old, his own children won't want to take over the fields, which have been in his family for generations.