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Bali is one of the few places on Earth made visually stunning by its main economic activity. The cascading terraces of rice fields are the most striking feature of the landscape, claiming even slopes that look too formidable to be of any possible use. The island is one big sculpture. Every terrace is manicured and polished, every field and niche carved and tailored by hand. Some plots are so small, they hold just four rice plants each. The Balinese have lovingly carved their own world in a series of geometric steps that climb up the volcanic slopes to the mountains where the gods live. Fringed by coconut palms, deep ravines force their way through this checkerboard pattern to the sea.

On Bali rice-growing is both an art and a science. Because of the island's superb drainage pattern, the high volcanic ash content, and Bali's equable climate, conditions for traditional sawah cultivation here are perhaps the most ideal in all Indonesia. However, rainfall in the lowlands is insufficient to grow wet rice, and Bali's steep and narrow ravines are not easy to dam. To remedy these problems, the Balinese have devised ingenious catchments to collect rainwater and channel water. Thousands of tiny waterfalls spill a precious allotment of water onto tiers of paddy from high mountain lakes to coastal rice fields. This complex irrigation system, continuously maintained, groomed, and plowed, has been developed over many centuries.

With a remarkable system of hand-built aqueducts, small dams, and underground canals, the island's terracing and irrigation practices are even more elaborate, sophisticated, and seasonably predictable than those on Java. Water is sometimes carried by tunnels through solid rock hillsides; water needs high on the ridges often require tunnels two or three kilometers long, some dug eight or nine centuries ago.

Internet image Subak is the name of water management (irrigation) system for paddy fields on Bali island

About 70% of the population are rice farmers and it's due to their expertise that the Balinese have been able to support such a refined civilization and theatrical, picturesque religion. The discipline required to share water and resources has also created a remarkably cooperative way of life. Rugged individualists cannot exist in communities where every farmer is utterly dependent on the cooperation of neighbors.

Rice land is not cheap, about Rp3.5 million per are (100 square meters). The main expanse of the island's rice-growing lands lies south of the mountains, in south-central Bali. These well-irrigated slopes produce three crops of high-quality rice every 14 months, with an annual yield of up to six tons per hectare. It's claimed this extraordinary harvest is equaled only by the "golden triangle" of Thailand and a small area of the Philippines. Specialized vocabularies deal with every aspect of rice farming, and a huge amount of time, energy, and money go into petitioning the gods so the rice farmer's work may yield good results.

A computer program called "Bali Notebook" now models the hydrology and rice ecology of Bali. Based on historical data, it calculates the likely effects of changes in rainfall, water flow, planting schedules, fertilizer use, crop yield, and pest damage to help establish a permanent water-management system for the island. s.

In 1969, a new "miracle" breed of rice, IR36, was introduced, a high-yield, disease- and insect-resistant variety developed by the Indonesian Department of Agriculture. By 1985 the new variety accounted for 90% of all rice grown on Bali, having replaced about 20 venerable old indigenous varieties, padi bali or beras bali, now grown mainly in the Pujung area. The growing time (90 days versus 180 days) and the yield (six tons versus four tons per hectare) make the new variety the government favorite. Yet many Balinese prefer the superior-tasting, lower-yielding, higher-priced padi bali. One can easily tell the difference between the diminutive IR36 and the magnificent, organically grown native plant, which stands as high as a human (120 cm)

Agricultural officials note that in 1970, even with all its land under intense cultivation, Bali still had to import 10,000 tons of rice annually. After adopting IR36, Bali began exporting thousands of tons each year. With the new variety has come drastic changes in the organization and technology of working rice. The large quantities of chemical fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides needed to pamper IR36 degrades the quality of the soil. Because growing the new variety is not as labor-intensive, employment has been reduced by at least 18%. Since the grains of the new variety fall off rather too easily, rice is no longer carried back to the village for threshing as needed.

It used to be common along Bali's roads to see bales of padi bali gracefully balanced on women's heads or bobbing at the ends of bamboo poles. No more. A number of traditional harvest festivals and ceremonies have also withered away. Women pounding rice in wooden troughs are giving way to thousands of mechanical rice mills. Since the new strain is considered "foreign," the Balinese feel it's no longer necessary to use the traditional handheld knife (anggapan) so as not to offend the rice goddess. Balinese now use sickles (arit) which shatter the new breed's fragile stalks easily. Still, small patches of padi bali are maintained, cut with anggapan to placate Dewi Sri.

Bali's well-defined dry season makes irrigation necessary, but the island's mountainous nature makes it difficult. Since a farmer is unable to build and maintain elaborate irrigation systems, only through cooperation with neighbors have the Balinese become famed as Indonesia's most efficient rice-growers.

The subak is a communal association consisting of growers, tenants, and sharecroppers who work adjacent holdings averaging 50-100 hectares. Acting as a sort of local "water board," this intra-village civil engineering organization's main function is to control the distribution of irrigation water and organize joint work projects to build and maintain dams, canals, tunnels, aqueducts, and water locks.

Internet image Subak

Internet image

In existence in Bali since at least A.D. 896, there are today around 1,200 of these irrigation cooperatives, each with several hundred members. All must abide by the same rules. Each member is allotted work in proportion to the amount of water s/he receives; a pekaseh arbitrates any disputes. All government programs to improve rice production are channeled through the subak by a staff of field agents who live right in the main rice-growing areas.

Though it's the bedrock unit of the Balinese community, the subak will buckle under to policies adopted by the central government.

In 1994, after the government rezoned the land around Tanah Lot to clear the area of rice fields, the regency cut off all water supplies to the local subak.

The villagers were eventually forced to relocate to make way for the massive 121-hectare Nirwana Resort. Even a venerable social institution like the subak subordinates itself to the imperatives of tourist development

The divine rice plant is the source of all life and wealth, a gift of the gods. Rice rituals differ depending upon place, time, and situation, but all over Bali huge importance is placed on the growing of the island's single most important food crop. As in other areas of Balinese life, women prepare the offerings, designed to gain the goodwill of the deities who provide water and other favorable conditions for a successful harvest. Before each planting season, the head of the local subak undertakes a trip to the mountain lake of Bratan to ask Batara Wisnu ("Provider of Water") for his assistance. A few drops of water from the lake are symbolically splashed in each rice field before planting begins.

Just as rite-of-passage ceremonies mark stages in a person's life, prayers and rituals accompany every cycle of growth in the life of the rice plant: germination of the seedbed, the planting, the plant's first birthday (42 days), ripening, Dewi Sri's "pregnancy," harvest, and at last a thanksgiving ceremony (ngusaba nini) in which a handsome meter-high cone of cooked white rice is offered up to Dewi Sri in the subak temple. Small bamboo shrines, resembling Thai spirit houses, stand at the corners of every sawah to hold the offerings dedicated to such agricultural deities as Ibu Pertiwi ("Mother Earth"), Surya (the sun-god), Batara Wisnu, and Dewi Sri, the lissome and beautiful rice goddess

Dewi Sri's deified effigy, fashioned from rice stalks, is found everywhere in the rice fields until the harvest is completed, when it's moved to an elevated place in granaries (lumbung) located in the backyard of almost every Balinese domestic courtyard. To discourage the evil spirits who are accountable for seed loss by birds and mice, offerings of flowers, rice, and eggs are laid before the shrine; cockfights may also be held to satisfy the spirits' bloodlust.

Made from palm leaf, this abstract female head with a large fanlike headdress is dedicated to the rice goddess Dewi Sri and dates from pre-Hindu rice cults. The figure is a symbol of wealth, fertility, and good fortune; ft can also be found on cakes, baked clay, or made from old Chinese coins. The art of cutting and folding young coconut or palm leaves in intricate designs, both for impressive large-scale ornamentation and small-scale temple flower offerings, is thought to be a pure Balinese art form, with no trace of borrowing from outside cultures.Internet images

There are no particular seasons for growing rice. Traveling over the island at any time of year it's possible to see all phases in progress. In fields side by side you'll see the stubble of newly harvested fields; the glimmering mirrors of flooded, newly prepared fields; the jade of freshly replanted shoots; the swaying green or robust gold of a mature crop; the burning of the stalks; the plowing of fields interspersed with bright green seedbeds. Sawah (a wet or irrigated rice field) are at their most beautiful when flooded, just before the young rice is transplanted. The smell of a healthy young sawah is akin to the odor of a healthy aquarium.

To prepare the fields for planting, the farmer first rakes and breaks up the bare, dry ground and stubble of the sawah; this is called ngendag ("opening up"). After hoeing, the field is flooded, then smoothed with a wooden sledge (lampit) pulled by one or two cows (buffaloes lack the necessary stamina) until the whole field is turned into a muddy, watery ooze. The dikes (pundukan) must be continuously cleared of vegetation that would steal needed water from the sawah.

Next, if one is planting padi bali, a corner of the rice field is walled off and a seedling nursery is begun with already germinated seeds. With the new high-yield dwarf varieties, the seeds are simply broadcast by hand. Seedlings grow for 25 days in the seedbed (ngabut).

Several days before they are transplanted, the fields are again flooded and smoothed, then fertilized with urea and TSP. The more intensively and diligently the field is worked, the higher the yield. The transplanting in the larger field next to the seedbed is a group effort, the shoots thrust one by one into the watery mud, spaced one hand's breadth apart and lined up in rows. As the rice grows and the ears fatten on the heads, the rice is said to be pregnant; at this time the fields must be vigilantly guarded from mice and birds. Fluttering plastic strips, rags, bamboo clappers, whips, whirring, clacking contraptions-even human scarecrows-are found all over the fields.

The water level in each section is perfect; little streams of water effortlessly flow from the highest section up on top of the hill to the very bottom section.

After four months (six months for padi bali), the deep green of the nearly ripe crop appears, turning a golden yellow when fully mature. Although only men plant the rice, harvesting (gampung) is carried out by both men and women. This is a time when the usual quiet of the rice fields is replaced with the lively chatter and upbeat singing of happy throngs of workers-a time of great excitement in a Balinese village. Working under great bamboo hats, every able-bodied villager joins in the work, including children. Harvest is an opportunity to meet future sweethearts. During a harvest the village streets are almost deserted, the banjar empty-everyone is out in the fields. Offerings are made first, the rice goddess thanked for her bounty. So as not to frighten the goddess, women cut off the ears of padi bali with a small knife concealed in their palms.

Behind the women as they progress across the field come the children, gathering whatever rice has inadvertently been left behind. These leftovers become the harvest of the children, which they can take home for themselves.Each handful of padi bali stalks is gathered into a sheaf of 10, handed to a man whose job it is to form the wonderful round bales (suwun). Ten sheafs comprise a 10- to 12-kg bale, which is tied with a bamboo string, turned upside down, and hung on the ends of bamboo poles to be carried back to the village in a sort of half-walking, half-running gait, or transported home on the heads of women.The modern, faster-growing hybrid IR36 is cut by sickles and threshed right in the fields, as it's brittle and tends to fall off the stalk if carried too far. After the harvest, the straw left in the fields is burned, enveloping the whole region in suffocating smoke. After several crops of padi bali, soybeans or some other legume are planted to rejuvenate the soil.

Traditionally, bundles of rice are taken from the granary and husked a little at a time, just enough for one day's cooking, or sold as the family needs cash. The rice stalks must first be threshed, which frees the grains from the stalk. Then, because the Balinese prefer white rice, the grain is pounded to separate the husk from the inner kernel, usually in a hollowed wooden trough by women using metal-tipped, two-meter-long bamboo poles they rhythmically change from hand to hand. The sound of several women engaged in this task is an ancient form of percussion; some musicologists theorize the hypnotic cadence produced is the origin of most forms of Balinese xylophonic music.

After the pounding loosens the chaff (nebuk), the rice is winnowed (njidi), the grains thrown up and caught on large split bamboo trays while the chaff falls to the ground or is carried away on the wind. The rice is then milled in one of the 1,500 or so gas- or diesel-powered mills found all over Bali. Mills purchase the rice outright, mill it, then sell the processed rice (beras) in 100-kilo sacks. Farmers can have their rice milled for around Rp100 per kg. The coarse bran, germ, and husk byproduct is used as food for pigs.  

Rice is the farmer's savings account. In Dutch times, farmers sold their crops for cash to the Denpasar rice mills, the money often squandered long before the next harvest.

Now, after the harvest, rice is stored in the banjar granary, or tied in bundles sepingan, to the top of tall poles. You still sometimes see these bundles of rice drying in the sun, particularly in the uplands.

The Indonesian government subsidizes the price of rice, known as the "mother price," so that all citizens are at least able to eat. Both government, military, and private-sector employees are paid partly in coupons that can be redeemed for rice.

Text: Internet (www.balix.com/travel/guide)

Pictures: Nicoleta Leu Copyright: All the images belong to their authors

Presentation: Sanda Foişoreanuwww.slideshare.net/michaelasanda

Sound: The Balinese traditional Bamboo & flute Music