The development strategy for sustainable livestock sector in small-islands region: a preliminary study on local cattle farming in Buru Island, Maluku Indonesia

Abstract

Beef cattle are relevant to farm products for the livelihood of most small-scale farmers in Buru Island in Maluku Province. Other than being a significant source of income for farm households, the presence of cattle farming on that island is also strategic for the Indonesia livestock sector as Buru is one of the areas in the eastern part of Indonesia in which has the most significant population of local cattle. Nevertheless, in recent years, its population has been observed to be stagnant even tends to decline; hence many issues of its sustainability arise. The national government and stakeholders of livestock development positively should respond to this phenomenon. As a contribution to solving these issues, this article reports our preliminary study, which generally aims to propose feasible strategies for sustaining the presence of cattle farming and its population, especially in the context of islands region economic development. Our results show that current cattle farming on the island is in the state of survival; thus the strategy for the development must focus on moving to the better state through ensuring farmers' access to available natural resources and on improving public infrastructures, distributions, and logistics of the farm products. Recommendations for designing such strategies and policies are discussed briefly.