Agriculture Minister Andi Amran Sulaiman stated that Indonesia has started exporting shallots from a number of regions to six countries.
Minister considered this an achievement that we should be proud of considering that Indonesia previously always imported shallots from several countries.
“We used to import shallots up to 72 thousand tons, now we are able to export shallots up to 6,500 tons. This is an achievement that we need to enhance,” he said.
In addition to shallots, he went on, farmers are also able to continuously export corn.
“We used to import corn up to 3.6 million tons, now it is zero import, and we can even export this commodity,” he said.
Furthermore, government is now able to push food prices in a number of border regions that usually have soaring food prices. In Papua border areas, rice hit Rp. 20 thousand per liter, but now with high national rice production, rice costs Rp. 8 thousand per kilogram.
In years to come, he continued, the ministry aims at dependency of neighboring countries to Indonesia.
