RI, world's largest swallow nest exporter

RI, world's largest swallow nest exporter

SEMARANG, Central Java: Indonesia is currently the world's
largest exporter of swallows' nests, with more than 80 percent of
the total swallow nest products world wide coming from Indonesia.

Chairman of the Association of Indonesian Swallow Nest
Producers, Sukmana, said yesterday these figures are not recorded
by the Directorate General of Forest Protection and Nature
Conservation and the ministry of trade since a large amount of
the exports carry no official license nor letters of quarantine.

Most have been unrecorded because the commodities have been
packed and sent through postal or cargo services labeled as dried
food stuff, he told The Jakarta Post.

Smuggling occurs mainly through Aceh, Medan, Batam,
Pangkalpinang, Jakarta, Bali, Pontianak and along the borders
between Kalimantan and Malaysia.

Aside from tax losses, Sukmana said, the smuggling may also
tarnish Indonesia's reputation as a signatory of the Convention
on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and
Flora.

The nests, which can be used as medicine and food ingredients,
are presently exported to Singapore, Malaysia, the United States,
Canada, China, Hongkong, Taiwan and Japan.(har)