Defend the Right to Land, Food, and Food Sovereignty

On September 24, thousands of West Papuans, led by the West Papua National Committee (KNPB), marched through Jayapura to mark Indonesia’s National Farmers’ Day. While the Indonesian state celebrates this day as a sign of agricultural development, for Indigenous West Papuans it exposes the ongoing reality of colonial exploitation, land grabbing, militarized occupation, and ecological destruction.

Merdeka West Papua Support Network extends its unwavering solidarity to the Papuan people and to all farmers and peasants across Indonesia resisting land dispossession, corporate greed, and militarized repression.

Hunger and Food Insecurity in West Papua

Despite its vast natural wealth, West Papua is facing a deepening hunger crisis. According to multiple humanitarian reports, entire highland communities have faced starvation in recent years, including incidents in Yahukimo and surrounding districts where droughts, frosts, and displacement left dozens dead and thousands more malnourished between 2023 and 2024. Families were unable to access their gardens due to both environmental pressures and military restrictions, with some communities forced to rely on limited aid.

This level of food insecurity is not a natural disaster. It is the result of state policies and corporate land theft. Indigenous food systems built around sago groves, mixed gardens, and forest-based subsistence farming are being systematically dismantled and replaced with monoculture plantations. The destruction of land directly translates to hunger for Papuan families.

Land Grabbing and Destruction of Indigenous Farming

The seizure of Papuan land has accelerated dramatically in the last four years:

• From 2021–2024, at least 111 agrarian conflicts were recorded in Papua, with 67% linked to palm oil expansion.

• Deforestation surged by 27,454 hectares in 2024 alone, much of it in Merauke and Boven Digoel, where mega-projects under the so-called “National Strategic Projects (PSN)” are being imposed.

• These projects displace entire Indigenous communities, strip forests, drain swamps, and destroy farming systems that sustained Papuan peoples for generations.

In Yahukimo, farmers are forced by TNI and police to access their gardens only at times dictated by security forces as if they are prisoners on their own land. This is not development; it is dispossession and humiliation.

Land grabbing of Indigenous lands in Merauke, West Papua, under the watch of armed Indonesian soldiers. Photo: Veronica Koman X account

Imperialist and Foreign Encroachment

Indonesia’s occupation of Papua is not only a domestic matter. It is tied to global imperialist interests. Since the transfer of West Papua in 1963, multinational corporations like Freeport McMoRan, palm oil conglomerates, and foreign-backed investment projects have extracted billions in profit while Papuans are left hungry and landless.

• Freeport’s Grasberg mine, one of the world’s largest gold and copper deposits, has poisoned rivers, displaced communities, and militarized entire valleys. The recent tragedy of seven Freeport workers trapped underground is yet another reminder that profits come before lives.

• The Merauke “Food Estate” project, promoted as a solution to Indonesia’s food security, is in reality a massive land grab — up to 2 million hectares targeted for conversion, destroying wetlands, forests, and sago, the very foundation of Papuan food sovereignty.

  
  

These projects serve foreign markets, investors, and Jakarta’s elite, not the needs of the Indigenous peoples whose lands are sacrificed.

Satellite imagery and land-use data reveal where land clearing occurred in Papua during 2024 and early 2025, which ecosystems were affected, and which projects and companies were responsible. Photo: Nusantara Atlas

Militarization: Land Grabs at Gunpoint

The Indonesian military (TNI) and police (POLRI) are the enforcers of this colonial order. Security forces are deployed not to protect communities, but to guard corporate concessions and suppress resistance. Human rights organizations have documented:

• Routine intimidation and violence against Papuan farmers and activists.

• Restrictions on movement, where villagers cannot harvest or plant without military approval.

• Over 100,000 Papuans displaced in recent years due to conflict between TNI-POLRI and the West Papua National Liberation Army (TPNPB), leaving entire regions without access to food or livelihoods.

• Arbitrary arrests, torture, and killings used to silence protest against plantations, mines, and “strategic projects.”

  
  

This militarization deepens hunger, destroys livelihoods, and criminalizes Indigenous peoples defending their dignity.

Solidarity with Farmers Across Indonesia

The struggle of West Papuan farmers is part of a wider battle across Indonesia. The same state policies that hand over Papuan forests to foreign and Jakarta-based corporations are dispossessing Javanese, Sumatran, and Sulawesi peasants of their land. From rice fields to palm oil zones, peasants are resisting the same corporate–military nexus.

We affirm that West Papuans, Indigenous farmers, and peasant communities across Indonesia share a common struggle for food sovereignty, land justice, and dignity.

Our Shared Demands

In solidarity with the marchers in Jayapura, Merdeka West Papua Support Network echoes and amplifies their demands:

1. Shut down all colonial companies (mining, palm oil, and mega-investments) that destroy Papuan forests, poison rivers, and displace local communities.

2. Stop the militarized land grabbing of Indigenous territories.

3. End the deployment of troops to guard corporate interests and withdraw the military from farming and food-producing areas.

4. Resolve the armed conflict through peaceful and democratic means, not military operations, and hold the Indonesian state accountable for systematic human rights violations.

5. Release all West Papuan political prisoners and prisoners of war.

6. End systemic colonial racism and open democratic space, including access for foreign journalists and independent monitors.

7. Recognize that only a referendum on self-determination offers a democratic and peaceful solution for the people of West Papua.

For the Melanesian people of Papua, land is mother. To lose land is to lose life, identity, and future. The struggle to defend land is not only about survival but also about dignity. On National Farmers’ Day, we declare that defending Indigenous land, food, and food sovereignty is a urgent duty.

Stand with West Papua!

Stand with Indonesian farmers and peasants!

Oppose corporate land grabs and militarized occupation!

Reference:

Merdeka West Papua Support Network Secretariat

merdeka.sec@gmail.com