Perubahan corak guna tanah sawah padi di Negeri Kedah

Abstract

Competition over land for agriculture use to fulfill the physical development is seen increase rampantly especially in developed countries. In fact, the world in general has perceived this phenomenon as a trend that cannot be avoided. This is because the development of an area will take place and continue and to place in any situation. But for a concern citizens, the changes in the pattern of agricultural land use will trigger worries for a long period of time. This would affect the stability of national food security. In Malaysia, a change in the pattern of agricultural land use also affects the rice cultivation area especially in Kedah, average 5,000 hectares of paddy field has been change in the terms of uses of land from agriculture to other uses since 2000 until 2010. Such a figure is enough to give a manifestation about how important of protection of paddy field. The paddy field will disappear from the topography map if there is no action taken. Therefore, this study is conducted to identify the governance framework in the cultivation of paddy field to rice industry in Kedah. Through this study, the changes of land use pattern and the size of the land of paddy were also be analysed in term of time series based. In fact, some of the factors that contributed to the phenomenon of change will be identified. The data for this study were derived through interview with the concerned authorities and a number of paddy field owner. Then, the data were analysed through qualitatively using descriptive method which is based on Grounded Theory. This study had found that most of paddy field areas had received the impact of anthropogenic activities such as urban development around it from time to time. The identification of the factors that contribute to the changes of paddy land use pattern can assist the concerned authorities. Besides, a few recommendation which touch on a new mechanism of agricultural land protection from this study could help the authorities to realize the important of management of the agricultural land. These information is expected to be a basic management tool to achieve sustainability food supply for future need.