THE CULTURE OF POSTHARVEST RICE PLANT UTILIZATION FOR UTILITY PURPOSES IN JAVANESE COMMUNITY

Abstract

Like other Asian countries, Indonesia’s staple food is rice and rice crops are its primary agricultural output. This reality addresses traditional Javanese as one of the ethnicities in Indonesia which have a close relationship with rice cultivation using postharvest rice plant materials or equipment in their daily lives. This paper aims to identify the Javanese agricultural community’s tradition in utilizing beras (rice), wuli (rice ear), damen (rice straw), merang (panicle stem) and mrambut (rice husk) as utility purposes through the lens of the Klaten Regency, Central Java, Indonesia as a case study. A field survey of the farming community found that Javanese were utilizing rice postharvest materials mainly for rice field and house activities. In production, there are 9 methods which mainly producing damen artefacts by bundling, tying and stacking. While in the process of utilization, there are 3 values practiced by Javanese which consist of individual, community relation, and mythological. This paper concludes that the culture of utilizing postharvest rice plants in the Indonesian agricultural community exists especially for the Javanese.