Agricultural Productivity to Fight Food Mafia Becomes the Discussion of Ministerial Dialogue During Public Lecture at IPB

INDUSTRY.co.id - Bogor - The request of President Joko Widodo to realize the welfare of farmers is the cornerstone of the Ministry of Agriculture (Ministry of Agriculture) in carrying out various performance breakthrough achievements. The President's directive has become a benchmark for the Ministry of Agriculture in fulfilling the prerequisites for agricultural development to be successful and sustainable.

This was stated by Minister of Agriculture Andi Amran Sulaiman, at the Bogor Agricultural University (IPB) campus, Bogor, West Java, on Tuesday (08/14/2018).

"A number of breakthrough programs conducted by the Ministry of Agriculture over the past four years have effectively increased agricultural productivity in almost all commodities," Amran said when delivering a speech before 4,000 new students.

From the Ministry of Agriculture data, in 2017 production reached 81.16 million tons. That number increased by 14.42 percent compared to 2014. Besides rice, corn production in 2017 also increased by 52.17 percent from 2014 to 29.86 million tons. While red onion production was 1.47 million tons, up 18.79 percent from 2014. "Chili production in 2017 also increased with the achievement of 2.38 million tons. Up 27.09 percent compared to the previous three years," Amran said.

For the livestock subsector in 2017, beef production was 531.8 thousand tons, an increase of 6.85 percent. Chicken meat production is 2.26 million tons, up 16.40 percent from 2014. Then, egg commodities also increased significantly by 20.21 percent, to 2.11 million tons.

According to Amran, the achievement of satisfactory results in the performance of the agricultural sector is the result of synergy with various parties, especially farmers as the main driving group. Amran emphasized that the realization of farmers' welfare is still the main objective of the performance of the ministry that he leads so as to reduce the poverty rate in rural areas. Data from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) released a decline in the number of poor people in rural areas from 17.67 million to 17.10 million.

Amran revealed that the program given to farmers to support their welfare included training and mentoring, development of sustainable food house areas, price protection of farmers with lower price and price policies, uptake of grain farmers and others.

In addition, the Ministry of Agriculture is also very strict in combating food mafia. The Ministry of Agriculture has long been registering and knowing about the food cartel that has carried out the sabotage, stockpiling, distorting information, bribery, manipulation to thwart the food self-sufficiency target.

"Right on the Agricultural Hybrid Day, the Ministry of Agriculture has announced a blacklist of five mini onion importing companies from India for manipulating them. Selling them as shallots and damaging the prices of local farmers. Previously seven importing companies were playing with prices," Amran said.

Realizing the World Food Barn

Under his leadership, Amran endeavored for the great ideals of Indonesia as a world food store in 2045. To realize this, the Ministry of Agriculture made various efforts.

"First, the policy problem. One of the tender regulations was changed to e-catalog. Second, fixing human resources, for example allowing the KPK to tap Ministry of Agriculture officials and dismissing individuals who proved corrupt," said Amran.

Then third, infrastructure improvement. Amran said that improvements had been made to three million hectares of irrigated land for a year. "The fourth is to fix agricultural machinery. Synergize with the Ministry of Finance so that innovators in making agricultural machinery obtain royalties. Thus, exports soar, production increases," Amran said.

Amran also did not forget to convey about the Ministry of Agriculture's policies which favored economic development in the community. According to Amran, the pesantren-based economic empowerment program was the first time in the history of Indonesian agriculture. "As a form and implementation of Indonesia's new economic flows through cooperatives and MSMEs. If people move, Indonesia must be great. That is the order of the President," Amran said.

In the future, said Amran, the Ministry of Agriculture will propose 10 priority performance by 2019. All programs will refer to national priorities.