Profit Sharing in Onion Cultivation: An anomaly in horticultural cultivation system in developing countries (A case study in Brebes, Central Java, Indonesia)

Department of History, Faculty of Humanities, Universitas Diponegoro, Indonesia

^* Corresponding author: haryono.fib@gmail.com

Abstract

By using the method of observation, interviews and literature study, this research focuses on the problem of how the 'mara' system, which is a traditional profit-sharing system in shallot cultivation, still has the flexibility to be applied in the current free market era when there are many landless farmers (farm workers). Field research proves that through this system, farmers who do not have agricultural land can be involved in cultivating crops, both food and other types. In that system, the risk bearer is a factor that is taken into account in the distribution of the harvest. The party who bears the greatest risk of crop failure will be the party who gets a larger share of the harvest than the other party. Consequently, when the risk increases, the percentage for the results also increases. This is what causes the share of the land tenant's harvest to increase when the cost of red onion production increases. This factor also causes the increasing workload of the farmer because the production costs borne by the land owners have similarly increased. Generally, the production costs in agricultural cultivation at a great high. The results of the research also show that in the 'mara' system, the owners get a diminishing share of the profits because they do not bear the risk of crop failure. This is different from the 'kedokan' system in rice cultivation where landowners bear the risk of crop failure so that the workload of land cultivators increases more and more.