Forced Cultivation: History and Meaning (Complete)

Forced Cultivation: History and Meaning Pengertian- Forced cultivation or known as Cultuur Stelsel is a system that has a purpose and benefit for the Dutch, forced cultivation or what is known as Culture Stelsel is a regulation that employs someone by force which really harms workers who are not given their rights such as salary and are also not given time to rest.

Forced Cultivation: History and Meaning Pengertian

Cultivation is a history for Indonesia, therefore let's discuss about forced cultivation which harms the workers a lot and why Indonesia It is very difficult to escape from the forced cultivation system which has provisions in the forced cultivation system and continues and is really detrimental to the workers Indonesia.

History of Forced Cultivation

In 1830 when the Dutch government was almost bankrupt after being involved in the war in Diponegoro in 1825 to 1830, then Governor General Judo who later obtained permission to run

CultuurStelsel or the forced cultivation system which had the main objective of closing the budget deficit of the colonial government and filling the colonial government's treasury which at that time had no contents or was empty.

At that time there was a policy given by the government that implemented liberal politics during its reign. But this policy failed. Among them

1. Liberal political policies are incompatible with feudal system in Indonesia and especially on the island of Java
2. The long and convoluted structure of the feudal bureaucracy prevented the government from dealing directly with the people
3. The state treasury is increasingly empty due to the unfinished Diponegoro War
4. Financial difficulties were getting bigger after Belgium, which was one of the sources of funds, broke away from the Netherlands in 1830
5. Dutch exports that lost in competition with Britain

And in order to save the Netherlands from bankruptcy, then Johanes Den Bosch who was appointed as Governor General in Indonesia whose main task was to find funds to fill cash vacancies, to finance wars and also to pay debts. In order to carry out this difficult task, Governor-General Van Den Bosch and his policy focused solely on increasing the production of export crops.

The beginning of the forced cultivation system was because the colonial government had the assumption that villages in Java had rent debts land in the colonial government, which should be calculated or paid for 40% of the main crop from village.

The Purpose of Forced Cultivation

A system of forced cultivation that aims to generate large incomes and has an obligation to grow crops that are marketable and needed on the European market. Example sugarcane, indigo, coffee, tea, cinnamon, and cotton. The forced cultivation system has several provisions, including:

1. Farmers who own land can provide one-fifth of their land so that it can be planted with the specified trade crops
2. Part of the land used to grow crops is mandatory so that it is exempt from paying taxes
3. The results of these trading crops are required to be submitted to the Dutch government, each having excess of the harvest and the value of the tax will be paid back the rest
4. Energy and time for cultivating trade crops so that it does not exceed the energy and time of planting rice.
5. Harvest failure must be the responsibility of the government
6. For those who do not own land, they are obliged to work 66 days a year on government-owned plantations
7. The land budget for obligatory crops will be directly supervised by the indigenous authorities. Dutch government employees generally supervise the running of the budget used and its transportation

In its implementation, the regulations that have been made are often violated or there are deviations such as:

• There are a lot of rice fields and people's fields that are neglected because attention is only focused on planting mandatory crops
• People who do not own land must exceed the allotted time
• The area of ​​land for mandatory crop planting is more than one-fifth of the cultivated land
• Land provided for planting is still subject to tax
• Excess yields and the amount of taxes that have been paid will not be returned
• Crop crop failure remains the responsibility of the farmer

Various deviations that occurred in the forced cultivation system caused enormous suffering for rural people, especially on the island of Java. Which raises the danger of hunger and disease occurs everywhere which causes a very large death rate. The danger of starvation that caused terrible casualties that occurred in Cirebon (1843), Demak (1849), and also Grobogan (1850).

This led to a drastic decline in the population. And also caused suffering that caused the reaction of the Indonesian people so that there was resistance, as was done by sugarcane farmers in Pasuruan in 1833.

Although the Cultivation System greatly benefited the Dutch government, it was actually the Dutch people there are also many who oppose it, the opposition is carried out individually or in parliament. The opponents of the Cultivation System are;

1. Edward Douwes Dekker

Edward Douwes Dekker is a resident in Lebak, Serang, West Java. He was very sad to see the bad fate experienced by the Indonesian people as a result of the Cultivation System. He then wrote a book called Max Havelar which was published in 1860.

In the book he uses the pseudonym "Multitali”. The book contains how the suffering experienced by the Indonesian people caused by the implementation of the Cultivation System.

The writings of Douwes Dekker which then caused the Dutch to be open to seeing the badness of the Cultivation System and also wanted the Cultivation System to be abolished.

2. Baron Van Hoevel

At first Baron Van Hoevel lived in Jakarta. Who then returned to the Netherlands and became a member of parliament. During his stay in Indonesia he learned a lot about the suffering of the Indonesian people caused by the Cultivation System.

Fransen Van De Putte wrote a book entitled Suiker Contracten (sugar contract). The two figures worked hard to abolish the Cultivation System through the Dutch parliament.

A few explanations about Forced Cultivation: History and Meaning Pengertian by About Knowledge there was a lot of suffering experienced by the Indonesian people during the colonial period, hunger and various diseases caused by the Cultivation System, hopefully it will be useful