Small scale food vendors hit hard by rising prices

Emmy Fitri, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The rising price of rice may not affect the middle to upper income households but it is surely having a major impact on the poor small-scale rice vendors.

Upi Sobri, 52, said she had to close her business selling nasi uduk (rice cooked in coconut oil) to school children last week because she could no longer afford the soaring price of rice.

She now just sits in her rented house in densely-populated Cipulir, South Jakarta, and occasionally helps her daughter to wash other people's clothes.

"... It is hard to find kerosene around here and if there is a supply, the price is too high for me. Now the rice price soars, too. I simply can't shop for anything," said Upi, who opened her stall (actually just a desk covered with a plastic sheet) in front of Grogol Selatan Elementary School.

For a small scale rice vendor like Upi, rice was already expensive at Rp 2,800 per kilogram but the price has soared to Rp 3,400 per kilogram.

With a capital of less than Rp 150,000, Upi had to spend more than one third of the capital to buy 10 kilograms of rice daily. Upi said she used to be able to make Rp 30,000 to Rp 35,000 per day.

"The rising kerosene price was already hard for us, now we have this (rice price hike)," Suci, another food trader in Petamburan, West Jakarta, said.

Most of the small traders did not know whether the prices of either kerosene or rice would return to normal or not in the near future.

There has yet to be a clear explanation from the government for the reasons surrounding the rising price of Indonesia's staple food. Some speculated that the lack of rice and its subsequent price rise was because harvests had not come yet in several areas, while the prolonged wet weather meant farmers could not dry harvested rice. The government had conducted a series of market operations in several places, but it was not effective.

Many reported that buyers were reluctant to buy the rice sold in the market operations due to its poor quality although it was sold under the market price, at around Rp 2,500 per kilogram.

Retail traders were still willing to buy the poor quality rice which was later mixed with better quality rice. The price was later set themselves.

The increasing cost of kerosene had also impacted on traders who were forced to cook a lesser range of dishes to save on fuel costs.

Other small-scale food vendors overcame the situation by reducing rice portions for their customers.

The steps had to be taken because the traders should keep the price of food low for the poor.

"There is no way for us to also increase the price, we are not a big restaurant. People will pay the same price but they will get less," Mantri, a food vendor in Slipi area, said.

Mantri, who sold Padang cuisine, said in the past few days he only cooked five kinds of dishes at the most.

He said the situation was bad and deteriorating as all prices were rocketing. "I'm afraid what happened in the 1997 krismon (economy crisis) will be repeated again now," he said.