Systems Thinking Perspective on Sustainable Agriculture Development a Case Study of the Indonesian Garlic Sustainable Production

Abstract

CONTEXT: Sustainable agriculture involves complex interactions among social, economic, and ecological factors. Therefore, achieving sustainable agricultural development requires a comprehensive response to holistically address this issue. The systems thinking perspective can provide a holistic view of a problem by combining paradigms, knowledge, and tools to clarify behavioral structures or patterns.OBJECTIVE: To overcome sustainable agricultural development problems with a system thinking approach by understanding the complexity of the relationships among sustainability factors.METHODS: Stages in developing system thinking modelling; (1) problem articulation, which is based on experts and stakeholders interviews, (2) formulating dynamic hypotheses by constructing a causal loop diagram, and (3) identifying system archetypes to determine the system's leverage and potential intervention points. We used Indonesian garlic production as a case study. Efforts to increase garlic production through various programs and has spent a lot of budgets have yet to reach their targets and show sustainable progress.RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS: We identify the problems underlying Indonesian garlic production, and by identifying system archetypes, we propose several intervention recommendations to improve the existing garlic production system. We found that economic, ecological and social factors are closely related. The sustainability of garlic production is highly dependent on the interest of farmers to continue cultivating garlic. This interest is rationally influenced by market and price certainty. In the ecological aspect are providing environmental-friendly technology assistance, including carrying out integrated pest management. Reducing dependence on chemical inputs and optimizing organic inputs will increase production cost efficiency. The interventions will change the system to achieve sustainable garlic production, ultimately supporting sustainable agricultural development.SIGNIFICANCE: Research on sustainable agricultural production with a system thinking approach has yet to be carried out explicitly, especially involving interactions and synergies between sustainable indicators. This research is significant for further analysis at the quantitative stage (i.e. to develop intervention strategies in dynamic system simulations). This study proves that a solid link between sustainability factors indicates that ignoring one of the factors will have an impact on sustainable development.

Keywords: sustainability agriculture, systems thinking, garlic, production, Indonesia