Page 76 - Ranah Studi Agraria: Penguasaan Tanah dan Hubungan Agraris

Recent Changes in Rice Harvesting...

B. Ceblokan and Tebasan
One response by some small farmers is the system called
ceblokan (in Sundanese) or pajegan (in Javancse). This sys-
tem was observed in only one of the sample villages, one rela-
tively far from the major rice growing areas. A group of women,
often as many as 10 for a plot no larger than 0.15 hectare, will
join together to transplant and weed a farmer’s sawah. They
are not paid for this work, but are given meals. At harvest
time, however, this group of women have the sole right to
harvest that farmer‘s crop, and no one else may join in with-
out their permission. They receive one-sixth of the harvest,

but since there are fewer participating, their shares are larger
than under bawon. Usually the harvest lasts long enough—ten
to twenty days—so that one woman can join five to ten such
groups. Ceblokan had been in use for about ten years in this
village and had come to be adopted, according to the farmers,
because of the very small size of farms. One farmer thought
that ceblokan would soon be used also for soil preparation,
work usually done by men.
This system has been effective in limiting the numbers of
those participating and in keeping shares for fellow-villagers
only. If the system spreads, it could easily increase the exis-
ting tension between villagers and outside harvesters; but in
the village where this system was in use, pressures from out-
side harvesters were not as strong as in other villages.
Tebasan. In some of the more important rice producing
areas, the response of many has been to adopt the tebasan
system. Tebas is a Javanese word which means to buy almost-
mature crops which the buyer must harvest at his own ex-

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