Indonesia's soybean imports still high

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesian imports of soybean were projected to stand at 600,000 tons this year, similar to the previous years' figures, as there are no signs local farmers have expanded their soy fields, a senior official of the Ministry of Agriculture said on Saturday.

Director of beans and tubers at the directorate of food production R.M.H. Manurung said Indonesia would only produce 1.6 million tons of soybean this year, while the country's soybean demand was around 2.2 million tons.

"We'll have to continue importing the commodity as the farming areas are too small to produce adequate soybean for the country," he was quoted by Antara as saying.

Indonesia imports soybean mainly from the United States, he added.

According to him, local farmers had limited their farm land for soybean because the yield of the commodity was too low.

"The farmers think that soybean is not a viable prospect," he said, adding that the farmers also faced difficulties in obtaining good seed.

To solve the problem, the ministry was trying to introduce some cultivation methods, including the use of herbicides, for the farmers to raise productivity levels of their soybean farms, Manurung said.

The ministry has also urged each regency to provide good soybean seeds and set up a good distribution network to deliver the seeds continuously to farmers, he said.

"If this mechanism works and farmers find it easier to get soybean, we're sure farmers will be more interested to grow soybean," he added.(05)