The interaction between real wages and institutional arrangements represents an important equilibrating mechanism that directly affects employment and seasonal incomes for unskilled women in Asia. This article examines recent trends in real wages and employment practices for women in the Javanese rice economy. The evidence indicates that the terms of institutional arrangements, like real wages, have improved with increasing demand for labour off the farm and rising labour productivity in rice production. These improvements have caused the level of women's seasonal incomes from rice production to exceed that which is indicated by the aggregate wage data, and have contributed significantly to the reduction of poverty among women in rural Java.

Rising labour costs and declining terms of trade for rice farmers on Java during the 1980s have encouraged the adoption of labour-saving technologies. This paper uses extensive field survey evidence to illustrate current patterns of labour-displacing technological change in the Javanese rice economy. It presents the recent introduction of pre-emergence herbicides as a potential revolution in labour-saving technologies, comparable to that of small rice mills and sickles. The evidence shows that the growing use of tractors and machine threshers is further reducing labour inputs. These changes will have a profound effect on the role of women in rice agriculture. The paper compares the transition in the Javanese rice economy with that experienced elsewhere in Asia, and shows that the adoption of labour-saving technologies has occurred more slowly on Java than in other countries in the region.

This chapter reviews the complex set of relationships among rice strategies, policy instruments, economic variables, and food policy objectives as they have evolved since the early 1970s. The intent is to provide readers unfamiliar with the recent history of Indonesian rice policy with a summary of rice policy and production performance and to offer already knowledgeable readers an interpretive approach to understanding how strategies, policies, variables, and objectives have fit together. The modest goal, then, is to review the set of policy instruments available to Indonesian decision makers, whereas the more ambitious intention is to interpret these instruments' recent se in the context of food policy objectives.)

This book examines the components of Indonesia's rice policy to help policymakers, analysts, and observers sort out the pros and cons of alternative courses of action. Containing the results of the Food Research Institute's third multiyear research project on Indonesian food policy, the book combines new field-based empirical evidence on rice farming profitability and rural employment and wages with long experience in analyzing Indonesian food policy issues and the international market for rice.

The extent of food aid since the 1960s is examined, focusing in particular on US food aid and its political context. The dimensions of food aid in the future are calculated, taking into account the effects of the Uruguay Round of Trade negotiations, the impact of new US agricultural legislation, and the prospects for improved implementation of food programmes. A series of political, economic and technical constraints will prevent large-scale changes in food aid in the future. A total food aid transfer of 10 million t per annum is the most likey forecast for the 1990s.

Lack of consensus among researchers in Indonesia concerning real wage trends in rice production has generated disagreement over rural labour market conditions on Java. This paper identifies some empirical difficulties associated with measuring real wages, difficulties which have contributed to conflicting results in the literature. It is argued that the choice of deflator and the time period of analysis play a significant role in the calculation of real wages. In addition, the regional dimension of analysis is shown to be important, particularly during certain discrete time periods in recent history.