Horticulture Seed Business Prospects Promising

JAKARTA - The horticultural seed business in Indonesia is considered to have a promising prospect to continue to be developed as a business opportunity in the agricultural sector.

"In agriculture, this coaching industry is the most supporting. Only one kilo of seeds can be sold for up to hundreds of thousands of rupiah," said Professor of the Faculty of Agriculture, Gadjah Mada University, Yogyakarta, Professor Aziz Purwantoro, quoting Antara.

According to him, the horticultural seed industry in Indonesia is growing and growing with many new types of varieties for vegetable plants and fruits released to the public.

"For 13 years I have been a member of the assessment, more than a hundred seed producers have grown and have released 400 to 500 new varieties for horticultural plants and around 60-70 percent more vegetables," said Aziz, who is also a member of the Horticulture Varieties Assessment and Registration Team of the Directorate General of Horticulture, Ministry of Agriculture.

According to Aziz, most of these seed producers are dominated by MSME business actors whose owners are generally people who have been in the company engaged in agriculture for a long time.

"They want to be involved in agriculture because this seed industry does not require large capital. They generally drop out of the company, at least they know about marketing," he said.

New varieties released by seed producers are dominated by types of vegetable plants, such as chilies, tinions, shallots, and melons and watermelons for fruit plants.

To remove new types of varieties, said Aziz, horticultural plants require plant breeding time of about three to four years.

"Sometimes for two years it could be because the vegetables are about three to four months already harvested. Generally, this new variety has an advantage in terms of higher production or more resistant to pests," he said.

Head of the UGM Agroindustry Innovation Center (PIAT) as well as plant breeding expert from the Faculty of Agriculture UGM Prof. Taryono added that every new variety released to the public should provide added value for agricultural products and have advantages over similar plants in the market.

"There must be something different in terms of excellence so that we have the wealth of genetic resources," he said.