Indonesian peasants, the Javanese peasants in particular, have long possessed a technology that allows them to produce enough food and income to meet all family needs and a surplus for sale, or taxes, if only they have enough land. With this technology, which is both labor intensive and pre-modern, 0.7 hectares of rain-fed sawah plus another 0.3 hectares or so of dry-land is enough to provide enough work and enough income for them. As long as empty land was still available in Java it did not matter if population increased. All that had to be done to meet the needs of the increased population was to establish new farms on the empty land. With a few minor exceptions the last such land on Java was already taken up by the beginning of the 20th Century. Since then the population has increased almost threefold. Population densities have become very high indeed in the fertile well-watered areas (4,000 persons per square mile, and more), and the hillsides have been cleared for farming by those who could not find land or work in the irrigated areas. Both the economy and the budgetary situation are much better today (1972) than they were in 1966. Such improvements will nonetheless need to be sustained and expanded further before the problem of over-population and poverty (in places like Sriharjo) can be solved. The magnitude of the task ahead can perhaps be best illustrated with reference to planned expenditures for family planning. The average expenditure per head over the plan period was set at Rp10 perhead. In 1971/72 the government planned to spend Rp1.4billion (approx., or about Rp12 perhead), and this amount was to be supplemented by a further Rp 1.6 billion from foreign sources, or about Rp 25 per head in all. This can be contrasted with the expenditures planned for India for the same period. India will spend, from its own resources, about three times as much per head as Indonesia from all sources.
