THE CONCEPT OF LEGAL AUTHORITY AND LEGAL POLICY OF REGIONAL FOOD SECURITY IN REALIZING FOOD SELF-RELIANCE BASED ON REGIONAL AUTONOMY

Abstract

The fulfillment of the right to food in Indonesia currently faces serious challenges due to global disruption and the rapid conversion of agricultural land in the regions. This condition is further aggravated by conflicts among sectoral regulations and the limited discretionary space available to regional governments in managing food affairs independently. This study aims to analyze the essence of the legal authority of regional governments and to examine the orientation of national legal policy in the administration of food security in order to realize sustainable food self-reliance based on regional autonomy. The research method employed is normative legal research using statutory, conceptual, and theoretical approaches. The findings indicate that the essence of regional autonomy requires food affairs to be managed as strategic-regulative authority, rather than merely as rigid administrative-implementative affairs. However, the shift in national legal policy toward economic liberalization and investment facilitation has reduced regional authority and weakened the protection of Sustainable Food Agricultural Land (LP2B). This has resulted in the marginalization of local farming communities due to the lack of synchronization between upstream and downstream legal frameworks. Therefore, this study recommends an ideal construction in the form of responsive and integrative legal reformulation. Regional governments, together with Regional People’s Representative Councils (DPRD), must be granted absolute authority to establish ecological zoning for permanent agricultural land, protect the legal culture of local farmers, and institutionalize the right to food concretely through Regional Regulations in order to realize strong national food self-reliance from the local level.