Development Communication in Agriculture : A Retrospective Study of Motramed (in English

(1)

Development Communication in Agriculture

A Retrospective Study of Motramed (in English : Mediated Partnership

Model) Program for Arabica Coffee Farmers in Bondowoso, Indonesia

By Lisa Virgiano

M10P0840@student.mah.se

Malmo University Communication Development

2012

Supervisor : Dr. Jakob F. Dittmar Lecturer in Media Studies, Malmo Hogskola, Sweden

(2)

Abstract

“Black gold is not oil. It is coffee.” – Anonymous

Coffee is an important commodity being traded daily on major commodity trade exchanges in London and New York. Meanwhile, in emerging markets like Brazil, Vietnam, and Colombia, coffee is a major source of revenue, with exports of coffee accounting for, in some cases, over 80% of foreign exchange earnings1_{. As the fourth largest exporter of coffee} beans in the world, Indonesia holds a strong opportunity to be a prominent coffee player in the world, not only by exporting raw material to developed countries but also by performing solemn roles in coffee global marketing strategies. Sadly, from preliminary research that I conducted before, I found out that the knowledge level of most Indonesian coffee farmers, particularly in coffee processing techniques, is relatively beyond par. How can Indonesia become a respected global player in coffee industry if the farmers do not simply know how to roast and grind their coffee?

Coffee does not only affect world economy. In fact, it touches social cultural aspect in globalization, diffusion of innovations and technology, agricultural sustainability, and human empowerment among coffee farmers. Based on those above notions, I decided to commence on a particular study of a Motramed (Mediated Partnership Model) program, designed and implemented by ICCRI (Indonesian Coffee and Cacao Research Institute), to specialty coffee farmers in Bondowoso, East Java, Indonesia. Over several weeks that I spent in Jember, in ICCRI headquarter, I met directly with ICCRI researchers who are in charge for Motramed development program under Dr. Surip Mawardi’s supervision, respective Motramed farmers in Bondowoso, East Java and Motramed’s social actors. We engaged in an intense dialogue and qualitative interviews regarding Motramed program and its implications towards social, economy, and behavioral change. The study result was tremendously proliferated by myself observation of exploratory study which through that process, I found significant relations between ground theories of development and their field practice.

1_{International Coffee Organization, (n.d). The Story of Coffee. [online] Available at: <}

(3)

Acknowledgments

A full recognition should be fully addressed to my supervisor, Dr. Jakob F.Dittmar, for his impeccable academic contribution to my thesis planning and writing. I will be seriously indebted with gratitude to his endless encouragements, especially when I had blockage of enthusiasm during this thesis journey. My deepest appreciation goes as well to all lecturers and fellow students in communication development program, with whom I barely met physically but I always feel their full spirit fortuitously.

I also would like to extend my deepest respect and admiration to my local collaborator, Dr. Ir. Surip Mawardi, SU, who has demonstrated true love for Indonesian coffee in a form of infinite devotion. Thank you for being such a friend, father, and fellow researcher..

My sincere gratefulness also goes along to the continuous support and understanding from my family, friends, and professional colleagues. You have inspired me to listen to my heart and its beats. Coffee thumps every single rhythm of it.

And finally, I will always remember how my respective sources of interview inspired me to complete this thesis, especially my technical assistant from ICCRI, Mr. Edi Santoso, with whom I sat on his motorcycle backseat, passing hilly mountain and breathing fresh clean air of Bondowoso to finally meet my fellow coffee farmers. You deserve greatest respect for your true dedication.

(4)

Untuk semua petani kopi di Indonesia dan pecinta kopi

For all Indonesian coffee farmers and coffee aficionados

(5)

1.0 Introduction

As a land area with almost 1.9 million square meters in size, Indonesia produces 329.000 tons of coffee beans, making it the fourth largest exporter of coffee beans in the world (source : www.ico.org, 2010) with a per capita consumption only 0.87 kg (source : Data For Crop/Calendar Year 2009, www.ico.org). Another fact is Indonesia produces not only robusta coffee, but also more than 20 varieties of arabica coffee from different regions with distinctive flavors and body characters. The varieties in coffee commodity do not only hold imperative contribution in Indonesian economy but it also serves as a means of development in agricultural, ecological, and socio cultural aspects.

On the other hand, the real condition of Indonesian coffee farmers is far from standard of welfare. They are often treated as an object by intricate supply chain in coffee industry. Middlemen often fiddle the coffee price because of the low quality coffee beans and farmers are blocked from the access to direct marketing channels. A development of coffee beans quality for an orientation to global market, as well as upstream industrial development, and other supporting industries related in coffee are considered as deciphers to increase coffee farmer’s welfare. By focusing on how development communication being adapted in technology diffusion for quality improvement, a practice of simplified supply chains through direct marketing channels with exporters, and upstream industrial development with stakeholders’ collaboration with shared mutual interests and goals, I let myself to unlock the keys of development initiative by investigating the nature, application of development communication in agricultural sector, and its insinuations to socio cultural aspect in globalization, power relations, diffusion of innovations and technology, agricultural sustainability, capacity building and development communication adaptation among coffee farmers in Bondowoso, East Java, being one of Indonesia’s specialty coffee region. Those development communication initiatives were carried out through Motramed program, an agricultural program designed and implemented by ICCRI (Indonesia Coffee Cacao Research Institute), with a focus on technology diffusion to increase arabica coffee beans quality.

I curiously intend to seek how the implementation of Motramed program being carried out to achieve its development objectives through trajectory of communication paradigm for sustainable development.

(8)

1.1 Background of Study : Motramed Description

Motramed is an agricultural development program initiated in 2002 by ICCRI (Indonesian Coffee and Cacao Research Institute) with a specialized development area in Indonesian arabica coffee. The first program was started in specialty coffee region of Kintamani, Bali and then the program was developed continually in Flores island, Papua, and East Java. Motramed was not mainly created solely to enhance fair trade implementation among farmers and buyers, it has own main objective, to diffuse the technology of wet coffee processing to the coffee farmers so they can enhance their coffee quality based on international standard. Later on, Motramed has achieved many simultaneous goals, such as to empower farmer’s communities by creating sustainable and alternative channels of income, to conserve the forest, to abridge supply chain distribution channels, to develop potential export market, to convince exporters to buy good quality of Indonesian coffee beans, and to promote Indonesian coffee beans.

Motramed was designed in several training modules to provide knowledge mentoring and capacity training in different aspects, starting from coffee beans cultivation, harvesting, processing, until direct marketing to exporters. Those training modules were disseminated through continuous assessment and escorting by ICCRI researchers during certain period of time.

As an initiator, ICCRI, also collaborated with respective parties to support Motramed program so it has greater impact to coffee farmers. Local stakeholders with shared and mutual goals are invited to participate in Motramed program. Each specialty coffee region, which have joined Motramed program, has particular stakeholders, starting from local government, local financial institution, local horticultural department, marketing partner, and coffee farmers association. Furthermore, I applied a terminology of social actors to highlight stakeholders’ omnipresence throughout all chapters.

For a case study of this project work, I decided to focus on an investigation of Motramed program in Bondowoso region, located in East Java, because it involved the most number of central stakeholders, causing comprehensive communication process and pattern that could produce pedagogical analysis in terms of communication in context with development.

(9)

1.2 Aim of Study

As the world's largest traded commodity after crude oil, coffee has provided employment for hundreds of millions of people worldwide. Coffee is crucial to the economies and politics of many developing countries; for many of the world's Least Developed Countries, exports of coffee account for more than 50 percent of their foreign exchange earnings2_{. Coffee} is also an intricate business. It involves multifarious supply chain channels with huge income disparity among coffee farmers, middlemen, millers, local traders, exporters, roasters, and business owners. From coffee beans to a cup of espresso in an urban coffee shop, requires several significant steps of botanical and ecology understanding, planting, harvesting, field processing, roasting, and cup tasting3_{. All of those steps definitely oblige dexterous human} power to fill in the gap between high demand of good quality coffee and its continuous supply.

With a strong focus on coffee farmers as an essential active part of coffee industry, this project work lands its own territory to create path of discovery and understanding how capacity building as an approach to socio economy development being conferred in Motramed program’s main objective, which is to improve coffee farmers’ welfare through coffee beans quality enhancement by utilizing technology diffusion to farmers. It will investigate and identify opportunities and problems of implementation of Motramed program to significantly provide a critical proposition for agricultural development in Indonesia based on actual facts found during the research. By utilizing combined social research methods and theoretical development concepts application, this project work will also pursuit communication challenges in agricultural development sphere and give integrated elucidations as a reflective approach to communication for development practice.

2_{International Coffee Organization, (n.d). The Story of Coffee. [online] Available at <} http://www.ico.org/coffee_story.asp?section=About_Coffee> [Accessed 24 March 2012]

3_{International Coffee Organization, (n.d). Bean to Cup. [online] Available at <http://www.ico.org/botanical.asp>} [Accessed 24 March 2012]

(10)

1.3 Research Questions

This Project Work holds fundamental research question as below :

How is Motramed program implemented to achieve its development objectives and to what extent its developmental contributions serve the coffee farmers in Indonesia? A single minded question mentioned above shall lead to several research objectives such as :

- To investigate Motramed program and implementation based on the trajectory of development paradigms in corridor of globalization context, power relations, technology diffusion, and capacity building.

- To identify and explore the convergence of development communication adaptation implemented by Motramed and their contribution to provide productive knowledge among coffee farmers.

- To reflect and analyze the development consequence generated by Motramed implementation.

(11)

1.4 Research Design

It is important to discern that a research design should not to be treated as another means of research method (De Vaus, 2004, p.9). As a researcher for this particular project work, I should pose a successful differentiation, between how the collection of data should be performed and how the setting of logical structure should be planned to follow the data enquiry, in a critical way, in order to ensure that the substantiation of data permits me to answer the primary research question as unequivocally as possible. To emphasize the role of research design, a researcher must be able to formulate a research question, specify the detailed of evidence needed to rejoin the research question, and to assist the research activity process according to its genuine objective.

1.4.1 Type of Research

To quote Yin (1989, p. 29) as cited by De Vaus (2004, p.9) :

Research design deals with a logical problem and not a logistical problem.

Thus, a coherent work flow should be ensued with a fundamental aspect of recognizing the type of research question as a primary step in order to know what type of data is needed for further analysis. This project work is considered as a descriptive research, with a simple question of what is Motramed program and its implementation. Following the basic step of it, the question per se will lead to another dimension of the case study and provoke empirical description through theories testing and data management process. It will try to describe evidence found during the investigation and all of significant characteristics about the case study in a factual and systematic way. It will make the case study as a form of categorization and advanced explanation how the case study brings development impacts to the incumbent farmers society in Indonesia. Being a descriptive research, does not mean that this project work only provide floating information on the surface. In fact, it will also scrutinize and problematize the case study dimensional effects with communication development perspective as its staggering point.

(12)

1.4.2 Case Study Design

Yin (1994) once mentioned that case study is an empirical inquiry, in which it is focus on a contemporary phenomenon within its real-life context and boundaries between phenomenon and its context are not clearly evident suitable for studying complex social phenomena. It follows procedural characteristics in the situation include: many variables of interest; multiple sources of evidence; theoretical propositions to guide the collection and analysis of data.

Case study brought myriad paradox to its application because it is often identified with loosely framed and non generalizable theories, biased case selection, informal and undisciplined research designs, weak empirical leverage, subjective conclusion, nonreplicability, and causal determinism (Achen, et al. (1989) cited by Gerring, 2007, p. 6). However, case study is chosen as a range of research design in this project work to test the theoretical predictions of a general model and to explain the features of a phenomenon (Gerring, 2007, p. 5).

Central components of case study design that consist of a research question, theoretical propositions, units of analysis, logic linking to the data to the propositions, and criteria for interpreting the findings (Yin, 1994) will be examined thoroughly to link the data collection and drawn critical proposition.

1.4.3 Methods of Data Collection

Case studies are often seen as prime examples of qualitative research -which adopts an interpretive approach to data, studies `things' within their context and considers the subjective meanings that people bring to their situation (De Vaus, 2004, p.10). Although Yin (1994, p.32) once affirmed that the method does not imply any particular form of data collection - which can be qualitative or quantitative, qualitative data collection will be my primary method through forms of below evidence :

- Related documents and archival records/journals

- Qualitative interviews (one on one and group interviews with semi structured questions)

(13)

- Participant observation by performing a particular role in the situation to get an inside view

- Physical documentation of artifacts and related activities

It is imperative to pre-identify the type of evidence in order to response the research question in the most convincing way. Research needs to be structured in such a way that the evidence also bears on alternative rival explanations and enables us to identify which of the competing explanations is most compelling empirically. It also means that we must not simply look for evidence that supports our favorite theory: we should also look for evidence that has the potential to disprove our preferred explanations (De Vaus, 2004, p.16).

1.5 Conceptual Framework

Miles and Huberman (1994 cited by Maxwell, 2005, p.33) defined a conceptual framework as a visual or written product, one that “explains, either graphically or in narrative form, the main things to be studied—the key factors, concepts, or variables—and the presumed relationships among them. Conceptual framework is considered as model map of what is exactly going on with a particular event/case study. It is a transitory visualization of minuscule and sporadic theories and its paradigm that relates closely to the research study or hold capability to indicate several vital aspects that could elucidate research problem empirically. Because of its function to assess, justify, and refine research design and its goals, I build up a conceptual framework which includes several important aspects of research design, such as formulating and understanding the research problem, to help me recognize the significant existence of a problem and how to acquire the right information to dismantle and find the correct answers for my research questions.

By utilizing qualitative paradigm in this project work, I have developed an integrated conceptual framework based from existing theories and research. A major function of theory is to provide a model or map of why the world is the way it is (Strauss, 1990).

(14)

(15)

2.0 Literature Review

As a fundamental proposition of this study, it is important to comprehend the concept of globalization and its impacts towards development because increased transnational economy activity has made global coffee industry endured dramatic changes over several past decades.

Roland Robertson firstly introduced the globalization theory by defining it as : The compression of the world and the intensification of consciousness of the world as a whole. (Robertson, 1992: 8)

The dimension of globalization entailed the concept of transnational economy activity for several centuries, it also provoked interconnectedness and awareness, and also at the same time, globalization is linked to a wider concept of neo imperialism and the global spread of capitalism. The concept of globalization has made coffee, as a precious commodity, became integrated into a global value chain process being mainly an exportable product for virtually all producing countries (Ventakachalam, n.d., p.5). To quote Nestle Coffee Report, Faces of Coffee (2004 cited by Ventakachalam, n.d., p.2) :

Today’s international coffee culture transcends the globe, transforming an ancient commodity into a phenomenon of the consumer age.

The main characteristics of globalization, as outlined by Eriksen (2007), such as : standardization, modernization, deterrorialization, acceleration, and localization, have made striking consequences to global coffee business, production of beans have shifted from country to country with such a boost in productivity. Consumption of the product has increased almost exponentially through huge sales and quality standardization at modern retail outlets. Globalization in coffee commodity opens up novel and broad economy opportunities for development. It is perceived as an interlink chain of development outline. It also has conveyed multidimensional transformation towards every aspect of human life. Jan Nederveen Pietersee (2001) even mentioned it in relation to development theories. Citing his outlook:

(16)

Gender, ecology, democratization, good governance, empowerment, culture, communication, and globalization now figure prominently in development agendas…Empowerment and participation are also ubiquitous in development management…Globalization is also a major vortex of change in the development arena (Pietersee, 2010, p. 15).

If globalization and development are interchangeably transformational concepts, then why globalization does not progressively contribute to an even economy growth and reduce poverty in global coffee business? Not all involved in the global coffee business have benefited equally. Small coffee farmers have suffered tremendous loss because a boost in productivity is not followed by quality and price improvement. Environmental degradation has also increased as ancient forests have been cleared in hopes that the bare land can be transformed into fertile ground, worthy of growing cash crops (Frank, 2004).

To answer above mentioned question and solve the problem, one must realize that globalization is not merely a hazy concept revolving around deregulation, trade liberalization, neo liberalism, market mechanism, and other free trade connotations. We must first recognize the different paradigms of development per se. To conclude several important paradigms (Pietersee, 2001, p. 5 – 8), starting from the 1800s until recently 2000s, classical political economy perspective had been shifted into several figures of development meaning. Conventional predicament such as nurturing a relationship between agriculture and industry during industrialization era was made as a well-built highlight to determine a meaning of development during 1800s, then incessantly economy driven policies of development were conformed during colonial economics, development economics, and modernization theory to encompass economic growth and capital accumulation. Although in modern economy paradigm, economy growth is the core objective to combine with political modernization and empowerment, development in general term, referred mainly to colonial resource management, first to make the colonies cost effective and later to build up economic resources with a view of national independence (Pietersee, 2001, p.7). Coffee, as one of valuable commodities cultivated by Dutch in Indonesia since 16th_{centuries, has undergone stagnant} development changes in social structure and farmers’ economy improvement even after Indonesia gained independence in 1945. Then, early attempts focused on rural development

(17)

were generated when development communication strategies deployed by western countries to promote modernization. But many development programs specialized in rural area to promote economy growth have proven nothing but greater discrepancy between corporate, state owners with substantial capital, and small land owned farmers with minimum capital, leading to neo liberalism practice. The practice also applied in Indonesian coffee industry.

To quote Pietersee (2001), p. 7) :

Neoliberalism, in returning to neoclassical economics, eliminates the foundation of development economics.. The central objective, economic growth, is to be achieved through deregulation, liberalization, privatization.. Accordingly, neo liberalism is an anti development perspective, not in terms of goals but in terms of means.

Following that sequence in general term, alternative development paradigm was introduced by focusing human development as an approach to empower people during 1970s – 1980s, contradictive paradigms such as neo liberalism and post development thinking played as an antithesis perspective towards the original meaning of development.

Those development paradigms also have created an intertwined relation between several key ideas of development communication : the centrality of power, the integration of top down and bottom-up approaches, the need to use a communication ‘tool-kit’ approach, the articulation of interpersonal and mass communication, and the incorporation of personal and contextual factors (Waisbord in Oscar & Thomas Tufte, 2005 : 78).

An illustration to depict its relationship will start from how centrality of power is applied particularly to support the paradigm of human development during 1970s – 1980s by empowering communities through knowledge attainment about particular issues, decision making process among communities, and power negotiation. When discussing about power, one should fully acknowledge the power relations to produce knowledge per se. Michel Foucault (as cited by Hall, 1997, p.47) inscribed the relationship between knowledge and power, and how power operated within. His approach perceived knowledge as always inextricably enmeshed in relations of power because it was always being applied to the regulation of social conduct in practice.

(18)

The second key idea of development communication is the integration of top down and bottom-up approaches. While top down application in colonial economics is identified as one of the key problem for a catastrophic of early development paradigm, a balanced combination of bottom up approach by using community mobilization and participation could create a better treatment towards development’s existing problem.

A tool kit communication approach seem to relate comfortably with new wave development paradigms, such as development economics, modernization theory, and dependency theory, where integrated communication strategies are applied not only to disseminate information but also to promote social behavioral change. It is the synchronized work of media and information technologies by using strategic communication tools that brought a diverse role of communication.

In correlation with tool kit communication approach, the articulation of interpersonal and mass communication relates very well with existing development paradigms. Mass media holds an indirect influence in stimulating desired message into peer communities and initiate social change opportunity meanwhile interpersonal approach could penetrate the persuasion process (Waisbord in Oscar & Thomas Tufte, 2005 : p.78-87). Interpersonal forms of communication might be manifested in the form of discussion groups, folk media, theater, and personal interviews, as well as other approaches. Thus, Communication For Development (C4D) is considered as an engagement process of mediated as well as interpersonal communication designed to promote socially beneficial goals (Wilkins, 2008).

Point of departure for an in depth exploration and reflection upon development communication practice with a focus on agricultural sphere, in this case the Motramed program, will be based not from modernization to promote economy growth nor colonial resource management vantage point, but from a society-centered approach to social development, as Midgely (cited in Pietersee, 2001, p. 128) pointed out that :

Social development as a process of planned social change designed to promote the wellbeing of the population as a whole in conjunction with a dynamic process of economic development.

As relation to that, Motramed program is also perceived as a suitable representative of development communication implementation using broad range of tools and methods to diffuse certain technology among the members of social system, in this case specialty coffee

(19)

farmers in Indonesia. Motramed’s training modules, which consist of standard of procedures in coffee process technology, imbued the articulation of diffusion of innovations expanded by Everett Rogers (2003) upon the individual process of social development. Rogers (1983, p.12) cited technology as :

A design for instrumental action that reduces the uncertainty in the cause-effect relationships involved in achieving a desired outcome.

The technology per se, often produces knowledge and even social change, then transferred by a linking system (agricultural system) to a user system (farmers) with a conception that it is mainly a one way process using top down approach. This technology transfer can’t be made effective unless the goal of the transfer process has made very clear (Hoffmann, 2011, p.27).

Diffusion is the process by which an innovation is communicated through certain channels over time among the members of a social system. Diffusion is a special type of communication concerned with the spread of messages that are perceived as new ideal. The main elements in the diffusion of new ideas are: (1) an innovation (2) that is communicated through certain channels (3) over time (4) among the members of a social system (Rogers as cited by Hoffmann, 2011, p.37). Although the coffee process knowledge introduced by Motramed is not considered as new invention in global coffee industry, but it conveys certain degree of relative advantage to user system (coffee farmers) because the technology delivers better quality for the coffee beans and the application of technology is compatible with the urgent needs of adopters and it is also easy to understand and apply. The application of knowledge is moreover highly visible to other potential adopters (other farmers) because it delivers result in quality improvement and automatically demonstrates better price in their coffee beans, inciting trialability by other members of social system to apply the same way of process method.

Additional core theories that will become critical and expandable discourses relate to the disposition and impact of related communication development theories : capacity building and human empowerment as mainly discussed by David Korten (1990) and Deborah Eade (1997). Social development, which also focusing on human development, identifies capacity

(20)

building as an approach to society empowerment, but does it mean that capacity building hold the same meaning and function with empowerment, in other words it provides help so people can be independent and have their own strength to act based on their own choice? Does capacity building only involve around knowledge transfer, educational program, power acquisition, and participatory communication activities? How capacity building should be ensued in relevance with sustainable social development?

As Korten (1990) explicitly stated that people centered development should support modernization development paradigm to enhance economic self-reliance and construct dependable sources of income by advocating small scale communities. They should have access to relevant and reliable information in order to make the best decisions for themselves and their communities. But will access to information be enough to increase self reliance? How they can be self reliance if the whole structural environment does not reform to support social reconstruction?

On the other side, Eade (1997, p.3) cited that capacity building is an approach to development, it is embedded in the social, economic, and even political environment with sustaining support from counterpart organizations. It involves interventions which should lead direct impacts felt by individual or social groups on a long term basis. Effective capacity building interventions must address the unique needs of an organization in its particular stage of development at that specific time.

To conclude this literature review, the analysis of case study of this project work will weave juxtaposition between several key ideas of development communication in social development paradigm based on globalization understanding and implications in interconnectedness and awareness of transnational economy activities, specialized in coffee commodity. Development communication key ideas are delivered through the application of diffusion of technology to user system (farmers) in several training modules contained with coffee process technology to produce power knowledge. Its outcomes permeate capacity building features with supporting result in organizational development and strengthen individual capacity in acquisition skills and competencies.

(21)

3.0 Research Methodology

3.1 Methodological Considerations

The investigation of case study components were explored and analyzed into two different research methods; qualitative interview: individual and group interviews, as the primary method, and direct observation in Bondowoso, East Java as the secondary method.

The main reason why I chose qualitative interview as the primary method is firstly, to construct site of knowledge (Kvale, 1996, p.2), in this case is to inquire about indispensable meanings from a subject’s experience and obtain understanding through a transformative conversation as a descriptive research for a further meaning interpretation, not to quantify verities as its main intention but more to gain insights through systematic reflection on the sensible and theoretical issues and secondly, the sensitivity of the interview and its closeness to the subject’s lived world can lead to knowledge that can be used to enhance the human condition (Kvale, 1996, p, 11).

Epistemology approach, a focus on analyzing the nature of knowledge and how is knowledge acquired, will be a sturdy basic consideration of my qualitative interview and also a point of departure. Marshall and Rossman (2006) use the term ‘epistemological integrity’ when referring to the connections between the nature of the research, overall strategy, research questions, designs and methods (King & Horrocks, 2010, p.8).

Pickering (2008, p.19) mentioned that although the process of research is one of dialogue, but this does not mean that cultural studies researchers should assume that knowledge simply derives from experience (the position of empiricism) or that experience simply validates what is said (the position of self-authenticating standpoint theories). That is why a balance notion with related evidence and how evidence is constructed through meaning should be complemented, thus an observation is chosen as a corresponding research method in this pilot project.

This second research method should act not only as a tool to complement my primary research method, but also to obtain facets of situations in my own language and interpretation

(22)

which afterward I could construct social situation based on the various facets that were obtained from my object of observation. In these circumstances, there was an opportunity to collect the different versions of events that were available. The result is that researchers can utilize their observations together with their theoretical insights to make seemingly irrational or paradoxical behavior comprehensible to those within and beyond the situation that is studied (Burgess, 1984, p.65). Observation, as a way to obtain data by watching particular event, physical object, or person’s behavior in a natural setting of specific location, allowed me to collect revealed information through deeper and richer understanding, which could not be provided through interviews. Whereas the prominence of my qualitative interviews was human interactions, direct observation highlighted more on objects and its supporting environment in natural settings. It helped me to perform analytical comparison about what was really going on in the field and also it helped me to understand more about the Motramed’s impacts in social development for Bondowoso coffee farmers.

3.2 Primary Method : Qualitative Interviews

Undoubtedly, interviewing is the most commonly used method of data collection in qualitative research, and this familiarity has advantages for us as researchers (King & Horrocks, 2010, p. 1). Considering the specific and idiosyncratic characteristics seized by qualitative interview as a method to collect and analyze data, I would like to emphasize on an open ended and non leading questions to build rapport with the subject of interview. I choose one on one interview because it also provides more time to individual to speak, meaning that the topic can be investigated in as much depth and detail, although it does not offer more breadth, in terms of participants numbers such we find in focus group (Meyer in Pickering, 2008, p. 75).

As part of a research methodology, qualitative interview has led an evident to a process where the design of interview protocol, in this case, by employing series of semi structured questions in an amicable conversational setting, created justification in relation to the research project. I had to reside in line with Oakley (1981) and Wakeford (1981) when they argued about structured survey interview puts the interviewer in an unnatural relationship with those who are researched (cited by Burgess, 1984, p.83). Thus, I determined to use semi structured questions which employed set of themes and topics to form wide-ranging questions so the

(23)

subjects of my interview had a broad opportunity to develop their own answers outside a structure format, but still in an established corridor of topic, and I, as the interviewer, was able to comprehend the discussion and followed up the next probability questions or other interesting fact that might arouse during the interview. However, Zweig indicated that this style of interview cannot be started without detailed knowledge and preparation (Burgess, 1984, p.85). This one on one interview shall be considered as a tool to obtain details of witness which I was blind to see and as an informant diary, in order to gain access to a situation which I was not present (Burgess, 1984, p. 87).

I also utilized group interviews by also employing series of semi structured questions because it provided opportunity for a dialogue to take place between the participants. Such situations provided a further opportunity to examine the relationships between the participants and the perspectives that they used (Burgess, 1984, p.96).

3.2.1 Subjects of Interview

I made selection on several subjects of interview based on intense discussions with my local collaborator, Dr. Ir. Surip Mawardi, SU, a senior coffee scientist at the Indonesian Coffee and Cacao Institute (ICCRI). He suggested me to travel to Jember and Bondowoso regency, East Java at the end of March 2012 because at that time, important social actors of Motramed program in Bondowoso met for a monthly evaluation meeting.

Based on my written research proposal to ICCRI, Dr. Ir. Surip Mawardi, SU provided me with wide access to contact numerous reliable sources for interview opportunities. Afterward, I performed series of one on one interview with Motramed’s representatives of social actors in Bondowoso, East Java on March 30, 2012 :

1. Mr. One Yusril Fikar4_{(he represented social actor from financial institution)} Bank of Indonesia (BI), Jember Branch - Representative

2. Mr. Suryadi (he represented social actor from local government sector)

4_{Due to myriad busy schedules of East Java Bank’s representative, I failed to conduct an interview with him. Base} on Dr. Ir. Surip Mawardi, SU’ s advise, I made Mr. One Yusril Fikar to represent Bank of Indonesia and East Java Bank simultaneously. Mr. One Yusril Fikar provided me with detailed information about what I need to know in relation with East Java Bank.

(24)

Head of Forestry and Horticultural Department in Bondowoso (2005 – 2011) 3. Mr. Bambang Sriono

Chairman of Indonesian Coffee Farmers Association (ASPEKI) – Bondowoso Regency 4. Mr. Asnawi Saleh (he represented direct exporter)

General Manager – PT. Indokom Citra Persada 5. Mr. Cahya Ismayadi

Industrial Pioneering Manager of ICCRI

I also made visits to two groups of farmers, one in Bondowoso and the other in Jember, to conduct group interviews with each of the group consist of three representatives. These interviews were made possible through the arrangement of Dr. Ir. Surip Mawardi, SU and ICCRI appointed technical assistant, Mr. Edi Santoso, who accompanied me to visit those farmers in rural area on Saturday, March 31 2012 and Sunday, April 1 2012.

The first farmers’ group that I visited was arabica coffee farmers in Bondowoso who just recently joined Motramed program on 2011. Original names are concealed to maintain anonymity. The subjects of interview are :

1. Mr. Ash 2. Mr. Antony 3. Mr. Andre

The other farmers’ group that I visited the next day was robusta coffee farmers in Jember who have joined Motramed program since 2005 and successfully established a solid farmer’s union and co op with variety of business line. Original names are concealed to maintain anonymity. The subjects of interview are :

1. Mr. Fred 2. Mr. Horace 3. Mr. Genarro

(25)

3.2.2 Interview Outline

Technically, semi structured qualitative research interview that I conducted was in a form of open conversation according to the interview guide that will focus on certain objective, which was to investigate the role and position of each social actor of Motramed program in Bondowoso region, the communication pattern and process with other involved social actors from their point of view, their agenda/motivation to participate in this program, and their own assessment towards the performance of Motramed5_{. The interview latter on will be transcribed,} and the written text material will be the subsequent interpretation of meaning (Kvale, 1996, p. 27).

I also prepared additional technical questions regarding Motramed background and purpose, content, target, cost, Motramed’s benefit to ICCRI, its communication tool kits, and way to deliver the message, for my subject of interview from ICCRI, Mr. Cahya Ismayadi. Since I conducted a semi structured interview, there were plenty of rooms for factual intensity of discovery; nonetheless I challenged myself to seek out the meaning level, although it was usually more difficult to interview to ascertain it (Kvale, 1996, p.32).

In the meantime, I also designed different set of questions aimed to farmers’ representatives because I would like to seek different angle of opinions and an opportunity to leverage my investigation perspective, not only from Motramed’s contextual outlook, but also from Motramed’s target perspective in social, environmental, and cultural direction. Another consideration why I adjusted set of questions to different group of interviewee is because of farmers’ level of education and their ethnography background might not stand in line with me. They are Javanese people who only graduated from primary school and mainly speak in informal Javanese language rather than intricate Indonesian national language. Their way of thinking and lifestyle are much simple than most urban Indonesian people, that’s why I sensed an urgency to simplify the tone of language, without loosing its main goal, and carefully planned how I delivered those questions. Questions set for the farmers mainly evolved from the basic quest to seek the real problem that farmers really dealt in the field, reasons why they

(26)

joined Motramed program, and later on I probed several questions regarding their experiences after joining Motramed program and how they faced obstacles, their opinion of dependency towards Motramed program and what kind of contributions they have made so far to the module development of Motramed. Finally, the interviews went well with a full assistance from Mr. Edi Santoso, who acted as my mediator, field supervisor, and language translator.

3.3 Secondary Method : Observation

An overt observation was undertaken during my field trip to Jember and Bondowoso on March 2012 to engage fully in the activities of my investigated case study. I performed a role as observer, according to Gold (1969 cited in May, 2011, p.172), an observer adopts an overt role and makes their presence and intentions known to the group. In this process they attempt ‘to form a series of relationships with the subjects such that they serve as both respondents and informants’ (Denzin, 1978, p.188).

I coveted not to perform an action as part of the coffee farmer society, moreover, as a viewer, I decided to acknowledge and understand more from the environment that I visited, to witnessed interactions, process, and behaviors, to comprehend physical settings of the ongoing field process of Motramed implementation, impediments, and to seek supporting facts, that I could not obtain from qualitative interviews. It was also important to comprehend that my observation allowed me to perform flexibility so continuous research inquiries could be signified and explored during the process. I rest my linear opinion with May (2011, p.175) when he cited that :

Observation is a continual process of reflection and alteration of the focus of observations in accordance with analytic developments. It permits researchers to witness people’s actions in different settings and routinely asks themselves a myriad of questions concerning motivations, beliefs and actions.

(27)

3.4 Ethical Considerations

In order to meet several critical standards of research ethics, I performed a thorough planning of research project and did an active consultation with my local collaborator to diminish the chance of misleading concepts and to meet the ethical suitability. I held responsibility to ensure that all of my respondents were well informed about the purpose of the research and reasons why I conducted this research project. They had to understand why they were chosen to be my respondents, they had to know about the benefits that might accrue to them as a result of participating, and in what way they should provide information to meet my research objective. I mentioned the research methods that I deployed and how long should it take to conduct it so my respondents felt free to make independent opinions without fear or negative prejudice. I also had to ensure the integrity of the respondents was fully respected, thus I showed the summary of transcribed interview to each respondent after the interview finished to seek for their approval. They read it thoroughly and then gave me a signal that the result was originally based on their opinion and allowed me to use it for further analysis. Interview transcripts listed full name of the respondents and their job position in appendix section to demonstrate credibility of respondents and their expertise. However, I need to conceal original names of farmers to maintain privacy and confidentiality since there was fact from them, covering the real situation of Bondowoso coffee business, which may escort divisive perception.

Ramos (1989 as cited by Orb, Eisenhauer, and Wynaden, 2000) describes 3 types of problems that may affect qualitative studies: the researcher/respondent relationship, the researcher’s subjective interpretations of data, and the design itself. Since all of my qualitative interviews involved human interactions all the way, I had to fully understand the main concept of relationships and manage power between researcher and respondents. I also had to aware of potential of conflict interests among my respondents since they had different positions and responsibilities in accordance to my object of research. A bias interpretation caused by personal attitudes and closed relationships with my respondents might injure my research objectivity. However, those ethical considerations did not limit me to request answers for my research questions, in fact I managed to create a favorable and conducive field condition, with a result of enormous access of data and field resources to verify and clarify answers.

(28)

4.0 Analysis and Discussions

An in depth exploration of findings that are closely related to the theme of communication for development, globalization context, diffusion of innovations, and capacity building will be done in this particular chapter by firstly discussing main findings and reflexivity about Motramed in Bondowoso, the relationship units to promote independency, and its program implications. Subsequently, I will apply theoretical framework to the empirical data by revisiting and investigating my research questions to bring new perspective of communication processes and interventions in the context of development.

4.1 Reflection on Research Findings

4.1.1 Qualitative Interviews

The value of reflexivity was effusively exercised during this research project. Researchers are advised to carefully consider their reasons for conducting a particular study (Marshall & Rossman, 1995; Maxwell, 1996, 2005 in Watt, 2007). The first reflective exercise that I engaged in was a careful scrutinization of motives in carrying out this specific theme of research, because it had main consequences for a trustworthiness of this project work. I was fully aware that passion and subjectivity were the main reasons why I chose a particular coffee themed research and made it into series of research questions. To quote Watt (2007) :

By engaging in ongoing dialogue within researchers through journal writing, researchers may be able to better determine what they know and how they think they came to know it. An introspective record of a researcher’s work potentially helps them to take stock of biases, feelings, and thoughts, so they can understand how these may be influencing the research.

That’s why reflection was crucially needed as a buffer for me to continuously work on this project with less bias, which led to refined understanding of not only reflexivity values, but all aspects of research methodology and its process. During my research, I constantly updated

(29)

my literature reviews, summarized research theories in my note, and highlighted the most significant and relevant points.

Throughout the data collection phase, a reflective exercise was also divulged when I did several interviews with each representative of Motramed’s social actors in Bondowoso. Each of them held different positions and roles and they also represented their own institution with different angle of intention towards Motramed program by exercising power within and among coffee farmers, as users. Nevertheless, I positioned all of my subjects of interview as a human being who not only held the detailed information, chronologically and cause effect related, but they also constructively shaped the information based on their desired intention, expertise, and knowledge. There are 7 committed social actors involved in this program, which are :

1) Bank of Indonesia Jember District

(as initiator, financial guarantor, and technology aid facilitator) 2) Local Government District of Bondowoso

(as a regulator, provider of infrastructure, training and mentoring) 3) Indonesian Coffee and Cocoa Research Institute (ICCRI)

(as research institute in technology dissemination and distribution mediator) 4) Bondowoso Forestry and Horticultural Department

(as provider of forest areas that can be used for coffee farmers to increase coffee productivity)

5) East Java Bank branch Bondowoso (as a provider of financial aid) 6) PT. Indokom Citra Persada

(as exporter and marketing partner of farmers)

7) ASPEKI (Coffee Farmers Association Indonesia in Bondowoso) (as farmers’ union organizer in Bondowoso)

From an extraction of interview results, I was able to explore the main differentiation characteristic of Motramed program in Bondowoso that determined its inimitability from other Motramed program in Indonesia. It was the social and infrastructure engagement made by respective social actors, ranging from local authorities, financial institution, research body, local

(30)

forestry authority, and marketing channel. Moreover, I found out that Motramed program in Bondowoso for arabica coffee farmers was formally commenced on March 21, 2011 through the signing of Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between related social actors. This relatively new program was planned to have duration of 5 years.

The first year of the initiation phase of Motramed program in Bondowoso was completely done by introducing wet process technology for arabica coffee beans to enhance beans quality and strengthen the role of farmers’ union in Bondowoso through the simplication of supply chain. To support the implementation of this phase, Motramed also emphasized on building business partnerships between farmers and potential exporters. A variety of studies, infrastructure facilities development, training and technology assistance have been implemented by related social actors, resulting in total amount of export figure : 18 tons wet processed arabica coffee beans produced by small land owned farmers in Bondowoso, East Java.

A triviality of Motramed program soon guided me to take important note especially when at first I expected my subjects of interview only to deliver statement and opinion about Motramed program from a development perspective. But out of expectation, they deliberately elaborated, with passion and their own subjectivity, about the inevitable causal effect of Motramed program towards social structure, environment, technology transfer, and of course, farmer’s welfare improvement.

To quote Mr. Suryadi (2012) from my interview with him at Bondowoso6_: “Coffee plants can be a perfect solution to provide sustainable nature conservation..Motramed program also train farmers to conserve the forest by giving them responsibilities and authorities. PT Indokom Citra Persada donated 2 million coffee seeds to be planted in remaining forest area. Bank Indonesia Jember also facilitates sheep barn with 100 sheep for coffee farmers so they can use sheep manure as coffee natural fertilizer and sheep can consume coffee leaves. Farmers can sell sheep’s fur to maximize their income during holding period (non harvest time). So, basically Motramed

(31)

program does not involve knowledge transfer and capacity building among farmers, it also created sustainable support systems because we believe each party should sustain benefit from this program.”

By making those consequences as my point of analysis departure, I managed to condense, apprehend, and create intertwined connection of Motramed basic model with its supporting units. The Motramed model in Bondowoso was adopted from the same model of previous Motramed program done in various specialty regions in Indonesia : Flores, Bali, and Papua with a minor adjustment to the real coffee business conditions in Bondowoso regency.

There were several supporting units that contribute to the success of Motramed implementation, as shown in figure 3 below :

Figure 2 : Motramed Supporting Units

Another point of reflection that I should affirm is the subject of interview is always making meaning, regardless of whether he is actually being interviewed (Holstein, 2003, p.14) and his role has certain implication in the production of knowledge. To quote Holstein (2003, p.312) :

(32)

Qualitative interviewing provides an open ended, in depth exploration of an aspect of life about which the interviewee has substantial experience, often combined with considerable insight.

In this case, my subjects of interview have induced significant facts of experience by providing me, as an interviewer, imperative basic knowledge about not only the detailed implementation of Motramed program in Bondowoso and novel insights of causal effect of each Motramed stage of implementation. One of the most crucial effect caused by the implementation of Motramed was forest conservation done deliberately not only to conserve the forest but it held main objective to increase coffee productivity by planting new coffee tress among shading forest trees, which complied with comprehensive standards of the Sustainable Agriculture Network from Rain Forest Alliance organization. They believed that the best way to keep forests standing is by ensuring that it is profitable for businesses and communities to do so.7_{I noted during my interview with PT Indokom Citra Persada, that they} actually hold this international certification and apply the concept with their farmer partners, including with Bondowoso farmers. Another global issue in coffee industry that I really wanted to investigate was the concept of fair trade in coffee. I was curious if Motramed holds objective to pursue international fair trade certification. And Mr. Asnawi Saleh, one of my subjects of interview from PT Indokom Citra Persada, provided me with insightful response by mentioning the originality of fair trade concept and reason why Motramed does not intentionally pursue its certification8_.

At first I easily took the interview session with coffee farmers in Bondowoso and Jember activity for granted because I thought I could gain full control over the data collection and interpretation from them. I also performed such a premature skeptical research attitude before I departed to Bondowoso, because at first I thought my research study was merely a generic prescription to agricultural development which only caused a huge benefit to social actors, marking coffee farmers as another object. But I thanked to my attitude, because it has

7_{Rain Forest Alliance, n.d. Certify Your Farm. [online] Available at: <}

http://www.rainforest-alliance.org/agriculture/certification> [Accessed May 11 2012]. 8_{Detailed interview result can be found in Appendix V}

(33)

created such buffer, not to limit my vantage of point and take it for granted, in fact, the buffer itself provided me grounded and focused research goals and helped me determining the suitable candidates for my subjects of interview and establishing fortitude to pursue them for several important questions. By conducting interviews with the coffee farmers, I have realized that through the form of their unplanned narrative stories, I have obtained more knowledge and hidden facts as ground breaking substances for further apprehension of this research study. To quote Kvale (1996, p.199) :

An interview analysis can be treated as a form of narration, as a continuation of a story told by the interviewee.

I was not surprised to learn from my subject of interview that coffee farmers around Bondowoso area do not hold basic knowledge of good coffee, but what brought me to disturbing surprise was when Mr. Horace (2012)9_{informed me that :}

“Near National Park of Ijen (approximately 120 km from Jember), there is PT Perkebunan Nusantara XII which produces coffee too. Their coffee is very well known but this state plantation company doesn’t care about small farmers. We walk separately even though we produce the same commodity. There is no knowledge transfer from state plantation company to farmers.”

Another intriguing question was asked by me to find out the effect of simplified supply chain model introduced by Motramed. Of course, this has threatened many coffee middlemen position. A disclosure explanation was stated by Mr. Antony (2012)10_:

“Some of middlemen that I know do complain about the transition period. They admitted that they lost income because Motramed simplified the value chain. Their house storage is empty because they can’t find many farmers who would like to sell coffee beans to them anymore. But now, we have 4

9_{Detailed interview result can be found at appendix VIII} 10_{Detailed interview result can be found at appendix VII}

(34)

middlemen who decided to join Motramed program by being farmers. They said that their revenue is the same.”

A condensation of narrative told by my subjects of interview, has constructed meanings that unfold the basic problem owned by many coffee farmers in Indonesia and it also provided compelling insights and opened new interpretation of Motramed’s contributions not only to coffee farmers but also to related supply chain channels.

4.1.2 Observation

Observation method was chosen to reduce the biasing effect and subjectivity derived from my qualitative interviews, although it held limited ability to provide detailed insights of human behaviors, attitudes, and motivations. I believed observation method could also help me to verify and perform consistencies between field facts and constructed opinions from my subjects of interview (Silverman, 2004, p.12). Thus, I utilized a direct observation method to oversee the natural setting of current coffee farm owned by farmers who joined Motramed program in Bondowoso short after I completed my qualitative interviews with several representatives of farmers. I spent 3 full days of observation in Bondowoso and Jember to visit 3 selected sites : coffee farm, sheep barn, and a house of crop processing unit.

The reason why I chose to do a direct observation to one of the coffee farms was that I would like to gain deeper understanding about poly culture cultivation concept, meaning that coffee trees in Bondowoso were planted under many varieties of shading trees to protect the coffee tress, enrich the biodiversity by creating natural ecosystem, and poly culture cultivation in coffee was also believed to enrich the coffee beans original flavor. I fully realized that this observation could only be done with brief period of time; so it limited me with broad opportunities to figure out the whole field situation. Therefore, I let a full assistance from ICCRI technical representative, Mr. Edi Santoso, to guide me during the whole observation process and with him, not only I did ground verification, took several pictures, checked the almost ripe coffee beans and the varieties of shading trees, but also I conducted brief interviews based on one on one dialogue to provide me with additional technical knowledge and prevent misunderstandings or misconceptions of which I might not be aware.

(35)

A visit to sheep barn near the coffee farm was also conducted to check the real condition of it. During my observation, I performed basic interview with Mr. Edi Santoso, which caused a rich result of discussion from different perspective. Because of his vast technical knowledge, he was able to provide me with explanation how the sheep barn could support farmers’ welfare to support statement made by one of my subject of interview about the establishment of sheep barn. Sheep was chosen rather than goat or cow because it has faster productivity, easy to be taken care, and they provide ecological benefit to coffee cultivation because sheep consumes coffee leaves and its manure can be used as organic fertilizer for coffee trees. Later on, I discovered that 100 sheep were contributed by Bank of Indonesia, farmers were given full responsibility to breed them, and they could only sell the new born sheep with equal sharing profit among the sheep owner and farmer’s union.

Another selected site of observation, that perhaps held essential role for this research study, was the house of crop processing unit in Sukorejo village, Bondowoso regency. I was pretty lucky to witness the coffee processing activity being done by several farmers in one sunny afternoon and I also took liberty to learn the step by step process, observed how the machines worked and how much water being used in this process. Mr. Edi Santoso explained the standard of procedure in doing wet process. It led me to further critical question, which is about water usage. From this topic, I managed to scrutinize and problematize the excessive consumption of water in this coffee process, meaning it did not hold any feasibility in eco friendly concept, and not so many areas in Indonesia have good infrastructure in water supply so technical barriers might occur. Departing from my critical stance about water usage, I lucratively revealed occurred quandaries faced by robusta coffee farmers in Jember and arabica coffee farmers in Bajawa, Flores. Water supply in both regions was very limited due to its geographical situation, thus farmers had difficulties during the early phase of Motramed implementation in Jember. Finally problem was recognized by farmers and ICCRI, resulting elongated water pipe construction with a collaborative project from University of Jember and ICCRI. Similar problem was also occurred in Bajawa, Flores with a solution by adjusting the standard of operation, especially in water amount. But problem does not stop right there. I also noticed that left over and used water was being wasted excessively. There must be a way to utilize water waste treatment so the whole process can sustain environment friendly concept.

(36)

4.2 Motramed : Setting Standard for Glocalization

In an important sense, globalization continues the work of nation building by creating shared standards, comparability, and ‘bridging principles’ of translation between formerly discrete and sometimes incommensurable worlds (Barloewen 2003; Eriksen 2003; Meyer et al. 1992 as cited in Eriksen, 2007, p.51). Previous statement was made possible due to one of globalization features through the continue process of globalization that demands shared quality standards. The same condition also applied for coffee industry to match the great international demand for higher coffee quality.

That is why Motramed program delivered the concept of technology transfer aimed to coffee farmers in specialty region in Indonesia. By setting standard of coffee processing method to meet the international market demand, Motramed attempted to enhance distinctive characteristic of Indonesian arabica coffee, and at the end, it will enhance coffee trade exchange by establishing qualified comparability.

However, as Eriksen mentioned (2007, p.56) :

A consequence of standardization is that many practices, beliefs, skills, and craft disappear.

Fortuitously, those consequences did not ensue among coffee farmers who joined the Motramed program because basically there were not high skills or coffee crafting owned by them. In fact, they did not hold any adequate knowledge at all. Thus, I naturally perceived that Motramed was initially set to fit into globalization dimension, which is standardization that the outcomes (better quality coffee beans) could be defined as glocalization concept, as stated by Eriksen (2007, p.58) :

In other words, anything that could have not been produced anywhere but in a particular location is defined as glocalization.

Another appealing perspective that should be translated into more analysis is the way Motramed program perceived as a means to strengthen the capacity of coffee farmers through the diffusion of technology process and how it contributed to social development. It will be translucently discussed in next units of analysis with a continuation of critical stance and questioning.

(37)

4.3 Motramed : Diffusing Technology to Build Capacity

Significant discussion of knowledge diffusion models and its application often could be found in agricultural sector which constituted novel technology for user system (farmers) by utilizing systematic procedure, institutional establishment, and communication process. However, the results may differ from one situation to another. An effective knowledge diffusion system must begin with users’ needs. It should begin with user needs and problems, and the system operates to find useful information, while many other, less effective knowledge diffusion systems take an opposite approach of conducting research largely in answers to researchers’ needs, and then attempting to find some use for the results (Hoffmann, 2011, p.27).

To support above notion, Schon (1971, p.81) as cited by (Hoffmann, 2011, p.28) reiterated that an innovation to be diffused must be fully realized in its essentials, prior to its diffusion process. Thus, to understand the essential of Motramed program in Bondowoso, I should embrace a summary of deconstruction of its technology diffusion characteristic by recognizing that actually all decisions in Motramed program were determined and controlled by technical expert and local social actors by using top down approach in diffusion of technology modules which most of the contents came from research and design conducted by technical expert (ICCRI). Technology push, which is the wet coffee process, was emphasized and fully exercised with a low degree of local technology adjustment. To conclude above conclusion, Motramed program in Bondowoso was basically categorized as centralized diffusion system. This category was made sense simply because farmers are not highly educated and technically competent. Moreover, the transferred technology required a high level of mentoring and intense trainings since farmers perceived it as new processing technology for them.

In general, although centralized diffusion system in Motramed was based on one way model of communication, it did not mean to shut down voices from bottom. In fact, based from my interview findings, I captured trifling participatory practice exercised by farmers when they actually did contribute technical yet simple suggestions to ICCRI about the training modules and the application of supporting units, such as in technical operation in sorting the

Development Communication in Agriculture : A Retrospective Study of Motramed (in English