Strategy for Reinforcing Local Wisdom Practices to Support the Development of Featured Products in Customary Villages

Abstract

The Village Development and Community Empowerment Policy which is formulated based on the Regulation of the Minister of Villages, Development of Disadvantaged Regions and Transmigration Number 21 of 2020 concerning General Guidelines for Village Development and Village Community Empowerment is a major breakthrough in realizing the big national agenda of sustainable development which is formulated programmatically in the National SDGs by the Ministry of National Development Planning in the National SDGs Achievement Road Map and the National Action Plan document.

The Ministry of Villages, Development of Disadvantaged Regions and Transmigration intrepreted this national policy into technical development by issuing a Sustainable Development Policy in Villages through 18 indicators known as SDGs Desa. SDGs Desa are the focus of policy formulation, planning, budget allocation and village development priorities, especially through priority policies for the use of village funds every year.

However, this policy still seems to hold the potential for uniforming village development and empowering village communities because it does not fully support customary villages and traditional communities which in many ways differ in terms of social, cultural, economic, institutional characteristics, governance of natural resources and the environment and their relations with the outside, especially modernity and democracy. It is conveyed that the formulation of policy, program and activity planning, program implementation, as well as monitoring and evaluation instruments to measure the level of village development and SDGs Desa achievements are made in general without considering the characteristics and uniqueness of customary villages and traditional communities.

The impact is that customary villages and traditional communities are forced to follow the narrative of village development and empowerment of village communities in a homogeneous manner. Even though there are only few customary villages and traditional communities in Indonesia, they have the same rights and position to be involved in the development programs and empowerment of village communities in an equal and fair position while continuing to carry out the traditions, culture and customs. Their rejection of the development agenda is not the reason they are neglected from involving in the development and prosperity from the country. For this reason, it is important to form a special policy to accommodate the social fact of isolation or rejection of customary villages and traditional communities from mainstream development programs.