The Abandoned Rice-Field Project in South Papua
Thousands of hectares of forest from Wanam to Nakias in South Papua have been cleared for a National Strategic Project aimed at food self-sufficiency. The pilot rice fields failed to take off.
Avit Hidayat
January 26, 2026
ITS official name is a pilot field, or demonstration plot (demplot). But the four rice fields the government built a year ago in Wanam village, Ilwayab District, Merauke Regency, South Papua, look more like a scrapyard. On Wednesday, December 3, 2025, dozens of empty shipping containers lined the entrance to the site. An excavator stood idle nearby, along with a forklift, a row of broken heavy trucks, and abandoned plowing machines.
On the emban
...