Indonesia to import 2.3m tons rice, sugar this year, says top minister

Indonesia to import 2.3m tons rice, sugar this year, says top minister

Suherdjoko, The Jakarta Post, Ambarawa, Central Java

Once hailed as a self-sufficient rice producing country,
Indonesia this year has to import 2.3 million tons of rice, says
a top official.

Speaking in the cool mountain resort of Ambarawa in Central
Java, Minister for the Economy Dorodjatun Kuntjoro-Jakti said
that domestic production had failed to match the demand arising
from population growth.

Indonesia achieved self-sufficiency in primary food
commodities in 1983.

"We have to be optimistic that we can reach the same stature
in the future," he said in a ceremony to commemorate World Food
Day.

Dorodjatun said that the government would also put sugar on
the import list.

"The importation of basic commodities is taken primarily to
help the country's poor," he said.

Afterward, Dorodjatun handed food aid to the people of Timor
Leste through the director of Indonesian World Food Program
(WFP), Muhammad Salifin.

The aid, comprising of 45 tons of rice, 10 tons of sugar and
500 packages of instant noodles, was donated by Bulog food
agency, Indonesian People's Sugar Cane Farmers Association
(APTRI), PT Indofood Sukses Makmur and a charity foundation of
the Indonesian Farmers Society.

Minister of Agriculture Bungaran Saragih said the people of
Timor Leste, which was formerly part of Indonesia, were suffering
from severe food shortages.

"We feel obliged to help them," he said.

While Indonesia's food supplies could be in better shape, the
situation is still better than in the previous decade, when the
economic crisis hit the country, Bungaran said.

With a population of 210 million people, many with an
increased knowledge of nutrition, the demand for a variety of
food and quality food has increased, he said.

"We must not focus only on increasing production. Although
production is still the main component of food supply, we must
not neglect the market. Therefore, product development must be
followed with promotion and distribution," Bungaran said.

During the ceremony, the government launched a new superior
variety of rice seed, called Fatmawati. Research shows that the
seed has the capacity to produce an average of 8.6 tons of rice
per hectare.

The government handed five tons of Fatmawati rice seeds to
eight major rice-producing provinces including East Java, Central
Java, Yogyakarta, Bali, Lampung, West Nusa Tenggara and South
Sulawesi.

The government also provided East Java, Central Java and
Yogyakarta with 782 tons of rice. All three provinces have
suffered from drought in recent months.

By mid August, about 450,000 hectares of farmland had dried up
and about 100,000 hectares of land suffered from crop failure on
Java island, affecting 250,000 families. The drought also left
tens of millions of people with no access to clean water.

Nationwide, about 1.2 million people have been affected by the
drought.