Compared to the main island, Bali, Nusa Penida is considered less developed, also shares the same problems related to water issue where household and agriculture competing with mass tourism development.
This condition becomes even more severe due to Nusa Penida's topography which is dry, hilly, rocky with minor rainfall each year - which is different from Bali mainland. There is no river in the district of Nusa Penida like other islands in the Province of Bali. The source of water is supplied by rainfall that is traditionally stored in “Cubang-Storage pits”. Cubang is a hole under the ground dug by villagers as a medium to collect rain during the rainy season in order to have water supply for the dry season, for consumption, cleaning and farming. Normally, one full water-cubang cover their daily needs for 2 – 3 months. The rest of the months, the community purchases water from commercial water tanks company. This happens every year and in fact, tends to become more difficult as global climate anomaly intesifying the effect.
The forest in Nusa Penida has been a habitat of the Balinese monkeys (Balinese Macaque) which is considered sacred by community. Monkey is now crossing over their habitat and infesting local produces (Fruits, Peanut, Corn, Tubers). There is no enough evidence pointing to a reason why those monkeys are becoming pests, but since their population is growing rapidly and probably not enough source of local food to feed. Also over-exploitation of mass tourism development where many vegetations are cut down due to hotels and resort construction, reducing the quality of monkey's habitat. Since monkey is considered sacred animal in their belief, no one dared to disturb them. Monkey is now the enemy to farmers.
The majority (over 50%) of Tanglad villagers are farmers despite the dry and rocky conditions of the village area. Many of the farmers practice mono-culture farming where the types of crops grown are generally seasonal crops such as cassava, tubers, legumes, coconuts and seasonal fruits. Some farmers also keep livestocks such as cows, pigs and chickens. All local farm produces are mostly to meet family needs with small parts are sold in the local market, to buy staple foods for consumption as well as payments. There has never been post production of processing agricultural products to increase the selling value, thus, the economic value is still low. Coconuts for instance, which are quite abundant and possess important role in sustaining the community income, are so far only processed into traditional coconut oil, while the rest of the coconuts part are not yet utilized to create other additional values. The same happens with moringa trees that are easily found in the village. They are only occasionally used as vegetables. The fact that, moringa is super plant, yet, has not become a knowledge among the people, and therefore has not been developed further into various products.
The drought, lack of water supply, the existence of monkeys that are now pest, and the non-existence of post-production processing have contributed to low yearly income average of farmer in Tanglad, i.e., is Rp.3-6 million/year, meanwhile the average income for those who work in tourism business is approximately Rp. 18 million/per year. The high disparity of income level between farmers and the growing tourism industry has dragged many young people to leave the village to work as tourism workers (around 47% of young people left the village to work in the private sector). In contrast, the tourism industry, regardless its fragile nature, offers shortcuts of quick money and services to mend the needs. As the consequence, many farms are abandoned and overgrown with bushes and scrubs.
When covid 19 hits the world (2020-2022) many people returned to the village as the tourism industry shut down, and so did the people of Tanglad. They put their hope back to their farming although they had to work harder due to the shortage of water to irrigate the farmland worsen with unpredictable climate anomaly. The drought and water shortages are exacerbated by the fast growing and uncontrolled monkey population. The monkeys cross-over the farms to consume the crops, resulting in less amount of production. To enhance the farming producations, the, farmers use chemicals substance, fertilizer, pesticides and fungicides, yet, they are wondering that their farming production is still decreasing.
The situation above has made Tanglad village in particular and Nusa Penida in general to become very much dependant on products (farming and industrial) from outside islands, either from the mainland Bali or Java.
