High school student Ria lives near rice fields in Bogor, but she never knew what it took to have a plate of steamed rice for lunch every day until taking part in a rice-planting event.

"Both my parents are school teachers. Although we live in a village, I didn't know how to plant rice nor the types of rice. But after joining this event I realized how great the contribution of farmers is to this country because they prepare our food," said the student of SMUN 1 Cibungbulang.

Hundreds of high school and university students in Bogor recently had their first experience planting rice in Cibatok 1 village in Cibungbulang.

The event on April 6 was part of national Rice Culture Week aimed at introducing young people to farming.

The week's events were jointly held by the People's Coalition for Food Sovereignty (KRKP) and the Pesticide Action Network Asia Pacific (PAN-AP).

KRKP coordinator Witoro said young people had long been secluded from farming-related development and thus most were not interested in becoming farmers.

"Through this event, we want them to learn about all the issues relating to rice and farming in the country," he said.

The national event was part of the 2008 Week of Rice Action (WORA) held simultaneously in the Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Japan, Korea, China and Nepal.

Campaigning against genetically engineered rice production in Asia, activists in each country pushed governments to protect the people's rice culture.

"Ninety-five percent of Indonesians consume rice. We have to protect local rice culture and pay the farmers the respect they deserve," Witoro said.

Commenting on the growing number of rice fields converted into housing areas, Witoro said the government should restructure rice production sources.