Cattle and beef stocks running low

JAKARTA (JP): Beef may become a rarity soon due to a sharp decline in imported cows and beef, the chairman of the Indonesian Retail Merchants Association (Aprindo) said yesterday.

Steve Sondakh told members of the House of Representatives that stock in supermarkets and other retail outlets was sufficient for only one month.

He declined to give details of stocks in warehouses of Aprindo members.

Steve said the 80 percent drop in the value of rupiah against the U.S. dollar since July last year had made imported live cattle exorbitantly expensive.

As the result, he said, the meat supply from cattle-rearing farms, which mostly use live cattle from Australia, had fallen sharply, he told the House's Commission III for agriculture, forestry, transmigration and food affairs.

Indonesia imports both meat and live cattle from Australia to meet local demand.

"Without further help to import more cows, we will face a scarcity of beef in the domestic market in the coming months," Steve said.

The cattle-rearing program needed both technical and financial assistance, he added.

The Ministry of Agriculture, in cooperation with other agencies, has been developing cattle-rearing farms in seven provinces of East Java, Central Java, Yogyakarta, Lampung, South and West Sumatra and West Nusa Tenggara since 1996.

Last year, the ministry imported 350,586 live cows from Australia, New Zealand and the United States for the project.

Steve said that it would be futile to rely on local meat production because it had also been declining since early late last year due to the soaring price of feedmeal.

"We are also facing a crisis in poultry meat because the soaring prices of feedmeal. Only big scale livestock and poultry farms can survive in this situation," he added.

According to data from the ministry, Indonesia's production of livestock meat reached 1.71 million tons last year, while consumption stood at 1.75 million tons.

This year, meat production is expected to reach 1.92 million tons, with consumption at 1.93 million tons. (gis)