Agricultural insurance in Indonesia is focused specifically on rice farming and is locally known as Asuransi Usahatani Padi (AUTP). To encourage farmer participation, the government subsidises farmers’ cost of insurance (premium) by 80%. Despite high subsidy, AUTP is still unable to reach the coverage target. The objectives of this study are to investigate farmers’ Risk Aversion Level (RAL), its influence on farmers’ decision to participate in AUTP, and the effect of farmers’ participation in AUTP on their income. The result of this study can contribute to enriching agriculture insurance literature from the point of view of developing countries and catalyse other studies on this matter especially in Indonesia. The analysis methods used in this study were multiple pricelist designs and propensity score matching with a logistic regression model. 130 farmers were interviewed. The results showed that farmers tend to have a high level of risk aversion (82.3% of farmers insure almost all of their land). RAL has a significant effect on farmers’ decision to purchase AUTP (< 0.01). A positive value of Average Treatment on the Treated (ATT) indicated that participation in AUTP has a positive impact on farmers’ income. AUTP is able to absorb production risks and encourage use of high input in farming.

Agricultural extension is one of the most important factors to increase smallholder sugarcane farmer capacity and encourage the acceleration of technology adoption which positively correlates with farm productivity. This study aims to evaluate the impact of agricultural extension on the productivity of smallholder sugarcane farmers in East Java. While few previous studies showing the relationships, very limited involving a relatively large number of samples. This study used data from Indonesian Plantation Farm Household Survey 2014 by the Indonesian Statistical Agency (BPS). The number of samples was 2,893 farmers consisting of 2,463 farmers who did not participate (control group) and 430 farmers who participated in agricultural extension (treatment group). Propensity score matching (PSM) was used to evaluate the impact of agricultural extension on the productivity of sugarcane farming. Typically, the treatment group is better than the control group. The treatment group has an average education of 7.89 years, land area of 2.74 hectares and sugarcane productivity of 72 tons/ha. Meanwhile, the control group has an average education of 5.96 years, land area of 0.88 hectares and sugarcane productivity of 61 tons/ha. Our results show that farmers who participated in agricultural extension have a 9.05 tons higher productivity compared to those who did not participate. Therefore, farmers’ participation in agricultural extension should be encouraged by improving the frequency as well as the quality of agricultural extension. While the number of extension workers for plantation crops is limited, recruitment of more extension workers can be an optional policy for the government.

The integrated value chain is a prerequisite for the successful industrialization of the agricultural sector. Contract farming (CF) is a useful instrument to integrate the agricultural value chain in developing countries such as Indonesia. The purpose of this study was to identify the determinants of farmer participation in sugarcane contract farming. The data utilized in this study was obtained from the Indonesian Plantation Farm Household Survey 2014 for Sugarcane. The data consists of 8.831 farmers distributed in 8 provinces. Logistic regression was used to estimate the determinants of farmer participation in sugarcane CF. The result shows that age, education, and type of cultivated land negatively affect farmer participation in sugarcane CF. Meanwhile, land tenure, cultivation area, cropping system, certified seed, membership in a cooperative, access to extension services, and membership in farmer's association positively affect farmer participation in sugarcane CF. The policy implication for increasing farmer participation in CF is to intensify the information of CF to the farmer with a large cultivation area. Since these farmers tend to participate in CF to anticipate marketing risks.

<p>The demand for broiler is rising rapidly due to its capability as the main animal protein source. In contrast, the production of broiler meat is unstable due to the possibility of farm risk. Contract Farming (CF) is one of the risk management tools for farmers but has not been used effectively. The purpose of this study was to analyze the factors that influence farmers’ decision to participate in CF. The analysis used six independent variables, namely farmer’s age, farm size, household size, education, farmer’s risk preference and risk aversion level. This study used primary data from 70 broiler farmers in Jember, which were divided into two groups, contract farmer and independent farmer. Each group had the same number of respondents. The results show that five among six independent variables significantly affected farmers’ decision to take part in CF. Farmer’s age decreased farmer’s probability to participate in CF, while education, farm size, household size and risk preference had positive effects. Farmer’s risk aversion level did not have any significant effect. The results suggest that the effort to expand CF participation should focus on young and educated farmers with large farm size.</p>

Studi ko-evolusi terbaru serangga-patogen memperlihatkan bahwa cendawan entomopatogen memiliki potensi toksisitas oral yang lebih besar dalam virulensi pada infeksi mulut serangga hama. Oleh karena itu perlu dikaji invensi jalur infeksi B. bassiana dan M. anisopliae melalui alat mulut pada larva hama kumbang badak O. rhinoceros. Tujuan dari penelitian ini adalah menganalisis jalur infeksi B. bassiana dan M. anisopliae pada larva O. rhinoceros melalui metode pemaparan cendawan entompotagen, Penelitian dilaksanakan di laboratorium Perlindungan Tanaman Politeknik Negeri Jember menggunakan Rancangan Acak Lengkap (RAL) faktor tunggal dengan perlakuan B. bassiana dan M. anisopliae asal isolat dari  Temanggung, Jember dan Jombang. Analisis data menggunakan Analisis Sidik Ragam dan analisis lanjutan menggunakan Uji Beda Nyata Terkecil taraf 5%. Hasil penelitian memperlihatkan bahwa Isolat MJb memiliki efektivitas tertinggi dengan tingkat kematian serangga uji mencapai 100% dan kerapatan spora paling banyak dengan rerata 8.9 x 109 konidia/ml pada hari ke 6 setelah aplikasi. Hifa yang banyak tumbuh di bagian abdomen pada kadaver terinfeksi M. anisopliae berbeda dengan hifa yang tumbuh lebih banyak di bagian kepala serangga uji yang terinfeksi B. bassiana menguatkan studi sebelumnya tentang jalur infeksi B. bassiana melalui toksisitas oral. Hasil ini akan bermanfaat dalam memberikan informasi terbaru terkait potensi jalur infeksi B. bassiana pada larva O. rhinoceros melalui mekanisme toksisitas oral yang sampai saat ini masih sangat sedikit dilaporkan.   Kata kunci : cendawan entomopatogen, infeksi mulut, larva, coleoptera