KONSERVASI TANAH DAN AIR BERBASIS MASYARAKAT DI NUSA TENGGARA TIMUR : Studi Kasus di Desa Ramuk, Kabupaten Sumba Timur

Abstract

Environmental management as well as soil and water conservation should allow involvement of active community participation so that it can support togetherness efforts for land rehabilitation. It needs government support to provide guarantee of law enforcement regarding community participation, including enforcement of indigenous knowledge that supports land and water conservation. Improvement of community capacity is a critical point for success of conservation especially in dry land area such as East Sumba. This paper is intended to give a picture of success of community based soil and water conservation in Ramuk Village in Pinu Pahar, East Sumba. The methods used for approaching the problem were direct observation and interview with conservation actors in that village, village administrators, religious leaders, community leaders, custom leaders and NGO who assist the conservation process. The study shows that modification of traditional model in soil and water conservation under multiple terrace (terasering) and bench terrace (teras bangku) enriched with diversification of multi strata plants applied in Ramuk Village resulted in excellent outcomes. The community has directly enjoyed the benefits of the conservation as can be seen from increasing of land productivity particularly in income, environment and livestock farming, hence encourage the villagers to participate more on conservation activities. Villagers have developed rotation-planting system with a 9-year off period for 0.5 ha, impacting in land fertility rehabilitation process. The development of family forest has independently support the needs for building materials and this lower the dependency toward their forest surrounded. The roles of local institution and indigenous knowledge have provided significant support in efforts to improve community participation in developing conservation.