IMPACT OF PROGRAM OF MECHANIZATION AGRICULTURE ASSISTANCE ON MAIZE COMMODITY PRODUCTION IN INDONESIA

Agricultural tools and machines (Mechanization) have an important and strategic role in achieving agricultural development goals in order to accelerate the achievement of national food self-sufficiency and the main strategic commodities in meeting the needs of food and animal feed. The problem is, not all maize production is of good quality according to animal feed and industry standards. This is what deserves attention, the quality of maize production increases so that it is able to meet domestic demand and opens up opportunities for export. For this reason, a study is needed to analyze the effectiveness of the use and utilization with an evaluation approach of the mechanization assistance program provided by farmers. The results of the study showed that 60% of maize farmers thought that the assistance was able to increase the production and productivity of agricultural products. The results of interviews with maize farmers showed that the estimated increase in maize production ranged from 20 - 40% from the previous one. Maize Shiller assistance is still not evenly distributed, even though this machinery is very helpful for farmers in overcoming post-harvest maize problems. The limited number of reliable technical personnel at the village level is a problem in itself. For this reason, the budget for increasing the number of maize Shillers, mentoring and training in the use of agricultural machinery needs to be increased, so that the distribution of agricultural machinery is evenly distributed and farmers who receive direct training can easily use mechanization on their own agricultural land