Barantin: MSME mentoring improves Indonesia's export quality
Jakarta (ANTARA) - Head of the Indonesian Quarantine Agency (Barantin) Abdul Kadir Karding said mentoring for micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) can improve quality standards in meeting export requirements, as the government seeks to expand the market for Indonesian commodities globally.
Karding said the main challenge faced is that Indonesia’s business unit structure is still dominated by small-scale enterprises, meaning meeting international standards requires mentoring and cross-party collaboration.
“We still have many MSMEs, the business units are still small. So building truly high-level standards for international markets requires hard work and cooperation with many parties,” Karding told journalists after the signing of an Indonesia-Uruguay MoU in Jakarta on Thursday.
Karding said Indonesia has many potential commodities that could be developed into export products. However, this potential needs to be supported by improving the knowledge of business actors, especially regarding quality standards and destination country requirements.
According to him, meeting export standards must be done from the outset by mapping and grouping commodities with international market potential. Once commodities are identified, MSMEs will be given training and mentoring to enable them to meet the technical requirements of destination countries.
Meanwhile, for MSMEs that still have limited production capacity or ability to meet standards independently, Barantin is promoting a consolidation model through larger companies as parent entities. Through this scheme, a number of MSMEs can be consolidated, trained and prepared to enter the export supply chain.
“So far we have many commodities. Those with good economic potential, where the human resources already exist, it is just a matter of knowledge. Those are the ones we mentor,” he said.
Karding said the move will be carried out through cooperation with various ministries and stakeholders, including the Ministry of Villages and the MSME sector. The government will identify commodities with high economic potential as well as human resources that can be developed.
Furthermore, Karding stressed that Barantin’s role is now not only related to supervising the movement of commodities to prevent the entry and spread of pests, diseases and vectors. Barantin also has a role in ensuring that products to be traded meet quality standards and technical requirements.
Therefore, MSME mentoring is part of Barantin’s efforts to improve the competitiveness of national commodities while expanding access for Indonesian products to international markets.
“Barantin today is not just about guarding the movement of goods, pests, diseases, vectors and so on. We have now reached the point of mentoring on traceability and quality standards,” Karding said.