Lack of cooperation hampers Garut dodol industry

Lack of cooperation hampers Garut dodol industry

GARUT, West Java (JP): Inefficiencies in supply and
fluctuations in the price of raw materials, technical problems in
the production process and in packaging, and limitations in
availability of financial support continue to haunt small
businesses. These obstacles are hard to surmount, particularly if
technical support and assistance, which has been provided to some
small dodol and dried banana chip makers in Garut through a
cooperative Indonesian-German venture, is not continued.

The program, known as the Small-Scale Agroindustry and
Agribusiness Development Project, covers West Java and brings
together Indonesia's Ministry of Agriculture and Germany's
Ministry of Economic Cooperation. The project has been carried
out in Garut for the past two years by the German development
agency GTZ/GFA. Two of the 35 businesses being helped here are
Aneka Sari, which produces dodol cakes, and Selamat, which makes
dried banana chips.

Along with dodol cakes, Garut is one of Indonesia's pockets of
small-scale industry and supports hundreds of local workers.
Aside from providing a means of slowing down regional migration
to urban areas, these locally-based small industries have also
shown themselves capable of encouraging the skills of local
entrepreneurs. Data from the local office of the Ministry of
Industry shows that there are currently 51 dodol manufacturers in
Garut, with 35 being able to make dodol cakes under their own
brand names. Most of the other 16 companies are actually new
businesses formed either by former staff or family members of the
35 larger dodol firms.

With about 75,600 workers producing 1,000 tons of food
annually, Garut's role as a center for small-scale production of
foodstuffs also has the potential to be expanded to help even-out
economic development. The determination of Garut's entrepreneurs
to continue with the dodol business, even as imported foods
nibble away at their market share in urban areas, is another
reason the Indonesian and German governments are helping this
type of rural economic activity.

Dodol cakes date back several centuries and are found in
various parts of the archipelago in different forms and under
different names. Aside from the now-renowned Garut dodol, there
is also Depok dodol, jenang from Kudus, lempo from Palembang and
gelamai from other parts of Sumatra. The development of dodol-
making means the growth of small-scale industry at the village
level and the use of local resources and local people. The raw
materials for these cakes, for example, can come from local
farms.

Assistance

The cooperative program with Indonesia's Ministry of
Agriculture and the German government through GTZ/GFA, developed
a two stage project to help small-scale manufacturers. In the
concept stage, the project was aimed at finding an accurate
mechanism for providing guidance and organizing a small-scale
industry development concept based in the principle of
interdependence and a network of agencies, banks and local NGOs.

The program stage identified target groups and began field
work directly through consultations, training and solving
problems faced by dodol and dried banana chip makers. Problems
included difficulties in production as well as marketing.
Financial management analysis was also conducted.

One activity of direct benefit at this stage was the Strength,
Weakness, Opportunity and Threat analyses conducted in
conjunction with the Indonesian government's Agency for
Industrial Affairs. This activity was then followed up with a
cost analysis program and has been seen as very helpful by the
participants. Asep Syaefulloh, 29, from the Aneka Sari dodol cake
company and Mudi Sudjana, 29, from the Selamat dodol cake and
banana chip company, both agreed on the usefulness of the program
in expanding their horizons and vision.

"What I learned from the SWOT analysis was related to the
problem of improving the quality of my products. One of the
problems I face is in the packaging of angleng cakes. This type
of cake, which is made of sticky rice, coconut and milk, has to
be wrapped in corn husks to make it harden so it can be easily
eaten as a snack. But not all corn husks meet the basic
requirements. If some contain a certain bacteria, then the taste
of the cakes will change," explained Asep.

This corn husk problem is also being reviewed by the project,
through laboratory testing.

"Based on the test results, we are going to try to overcome
the problem through a sterilization process using local
materials," says Frank Pohl, a German expert who has been working
with the GFA program in West Java for the past two years.

Hopes

Aneka Sari also received help to solve management problems in
supply, storage and preservation of raw materials, especially its
specialty soursop fruit. The company is now conducting an
experiment to preserve the raw materials used for this type of
cake. The simple experiment, involving four plastic buckets and a
chemical formula, is being carried out by Aneka Sari under GFA
supervision in order to make the production process more
efficient and the management of raw materials more effective.

"If BPPT (Indonesia's Agency for the Application and
Assessment of Technology) had some method for resolving these
kinds of technical problems, it would help us dodol makers very
much," says Asep.

A similar problem is also faced by Mudi Sudjana from dried
banana chip producer Selamat. He must find the most effective way
to use bananas. At its processing center in Bungbulan, South
Garut, Selamat now uses one ton of bananas to produce only 150 kg
of dried banana chips. Efforts to reduce this gap, even after the
banana skin and stem have been removed and the fruit cleaned,
have not been successful.

"We tried in Pamengpeuk and in South Garut but results were
even worse. From one ton of bananas, we were only able to produce
120 kg of banana chips. The taste of the chips we produced from
bananas we grew ourselves in Pamengpeuk was also not as good and
below the standards of the chips we process in Bungbulan. I do
not know if this is related to conditions of the local geography,
or not," explains Mudi who is no longer experimenting with
finding the right technology for preserving his raw materials.

Mudi believes that it will be difficult for small industries
to grow if they continue to store their stock in conventional
ways, as they are forced by circumstance to do now.

State banks

Asep and Mudi hope that government agencies will become
interested in conducting experiments and applying technological
research to develop small-scale industries.

"If we continue to do this by ourselves, it will obviously be
difficult. Securing funds for business development has been hard
enough. Interest rates are quite high. It is also hard to get
loans from state banks. The proof of this is that it has already
been several months since we submitted a proposal to Jasa
Rahardja. Even though their staff has already visited our
factory, we still have had no response," complains Mudi.

Unlike Mudi at Selamat, Aneka Sari has received a soft loan
from the state electric company. Although the loan only amounts
to Rp 6 million, with an annual interest rate of 4 percent, Asep
feels that this assistance has helped reduce the demands on his
company's cash flow.

"We would like it if the program help which has already been
of benefit to us could be continued, or even expanded further,"
states Asep.

Along with his support for Asep's wish, Mudi also hopes for
improved cooperation, particularly among government agencies, in
helping develop small industries. So far it has been primarily
handled by the Department of Cooperatives and Development of
Small Business.

"An example would be if the Agency for Primary Agricultural
Products would propose that the Bungbulan farmers plant more
bananas, so our supply is secure. Our supply is frequently
disrupted now because many of the farmers growing bananas are
obligated to sell the bananas to dealers who then ship the fruit
to Jakarta and Bandung," says Mudi.

Asep also suffers from the same problem with regards to the
supply of kidney beans. Although it is not clear if the problem
comes from the number of cake makers now making bean dodol, the
supply of locally-grown beans is very limited. The price of
kidney beans in January 1995 jumped from Rp 700 per kg to Rp
1,400 per kg. The scarcity in the supply of this raw material,
which has almost disappeared from the market, has very much
disrupted the making of these sticky cakes.

Association

Both Asep and Mudi believe that some form of association or
cooperative of dodol makers needs to be formed in order to
guarantee the availability of raw materials. For makers of these
cakes, which tend to be home-based industries employing less than
30 people, such an association could, if nothing else, help
guarantee the supply of the specific type of sticky rice used as
the primary ingredient in cake production.

"In general, the most appropriate kind of sticky rice costs Rp
1,300 per kg and is hard to find on the market, because it is
usually bought up by the large producers, like Herlinah Cipta
Pratama which makes the Picnic brand of dodol. The only other
kind of sticky rice left costs Rp 1,100 kg," explains Asep.

The need to form an association is seen as necessary by Mudi
not only to ward off the chances of price fixing by suppliers but
also to create coordination in marketing.

"Such an association could help the smaller members by saving
on the cost of transport," says Mudi.

This type of association was actually formed in Garut in 1950
with the name Conglomeration of Garut Dodol Makers. It was aimed
at limiting unhealthy competition. The association was headed by
Dachlan Soeriawinata and had 17 members but only lasted two
years. Later on, when raw material problems affected dodol makers
in 1959, an attempt was made to resurrect the association but,
once again, it failed because the economic crises of the 1960s
caused many cake makers to collapse. Only Picnic, Hadidjah and
Sarinah survived.

With recent developments in the dodol industry however, the
need to form an association seems pressing, particularly as
manufacturers move from being cottage industries to slightly
larger enterprises employing more people. This development is in
some measure due to the bilateral assistance provided to these
small-scale producers. (Kastorius Sinaga)