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IrelandAsianometry revisits Indonesia's rice project that drained the peatlands
An unusually fast-starting history essay explains how a food-security plan left Central Kalimantan with damaged land and recurring fires.
Asianometry
Story of Why this story? The video opened at a pace of 141,284 views a day, 14 times a normal first day on this channel (9,891).
Indonesia’s Mega Rice Failure
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- 4:59High-yielding rice varieties and oil-funded investment helped Indonesia achieve rice self-sufficiency under Suharto.
- 8:36Central Kalimantan's deep peatlands presented ecological conditions very different from Java's rice-growing land.
- 11:58Dayak farming on shallow coastal peat did not establish that inland peat could support mass rice cultivation.
- 14:14Suharto launched the vast conversion project despite scientific and environmental warnings.
- 16:47Canals drained deep peat domes, leaving land vulnerable to the drought and fires that followed.
- 22:28Restoration includes blocking canals to rewet damaged peatlands, though food-growing schemes have continued.
Why did Indonesia's plan for new rice fields leave fire-prone land instead? Asianometry's answer starts with the ground itself: deep peatlands were treated as farmland waiting to be opened up, rather than a fragile landscape dependent on water.
"Indonesia's Mega Rice Failure" follows Suharto's attempt to turn Central Kalimantan into a rice basket. The essay drew an estimated 140,000 views in its first day, around fourteen times Asianometry's usual opening audience.
The story is not simply that Indonesia needed more rice. Asianometry first explains how the country achieved rice self-sufficiency under Suharto, helped by high-yielding varieties and oil-funded investment. Then production growth slowed, Java lost farmland to development, and imports returned.
The proposed solution was enormous: convert more than a million hectares into rice paddies. But the essay makes an important distinction between the Dayak people's established farming on shallow coastal peat and the mass cultivation planned farther inland. Experience with one did not make the other workable.
Drainage canals cut through deep peat domes and drew out their water. Drought followed, and the dried peat helped fuel the devastating fires and regional haze of 1997. Through archival photographs, maps and reports, Asianometry connects the agricultural decision to the environmental consequences.
The project was formally canceled in 1999, but cancellation could not restore the landscape. The closing section follows efforts to block canals and rewet the peat, while explaining that plans to grow food on the land have continued.
Published on Trari
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- Channel
- Asianometry
- Subscribers
- 969,000 ▲ 1,000 this week
- Channel views, last 7 days
- 595,306
- Channel views, pace per day
- 217,997 (on a normal day: 75,959)
- Video published
- November 12, 2026
- Video views so far
- 172,380 (2 days online)
- Video views, pace per day
- 144,500
The numbers
The rice essay's estimated first-day audience was far above Asianometry's usual start. Its comments arrived at nearly twice the usual first-day pace.
💡 Test your knowledge
Central Kalimantan lies on which island?
Central Kalimantan is a province in the Indonesian portion of Borneo.