Ministry Of Agriculture: Diversification To Local Food Is A Solution To Avoid Crisis

JAKARTA - Head of the Agricultural Extension and Human Resources Development Agency (PPSDM) of the Ministry of Agriculture, Dedi Nursyamsi, said that diversification into local food is the solution so that Indonesia can avoid the global food crisis.

"The solution is that we must boost local food, we must diversify imported food into local food. Replace wheat with tubers, with cassava, with radishes, and so on," said Dedi, quoted by Antara, Saturday, June 11.

Dedi said that food prices which have increased significantly at this time are a symptom of the food crisis that is starting to occur. The food crisis is caused by the lack of food supply in the world due to climate change.

Rising sea levels that flood agricultural land, long droughts, forest fires, and pest attacks on agricultural land have caused a decrease in the production of agricultural commodities which resulted in a lack of supply and soaring food prices.

According to the World Food Agency (FAO), said Dedi, Indonesia is one of the countries affected by the global food crisis due to its large population. Therefore, according to Dedi, Indonesia must be able to meet its food needs independently and not depend on imported food commodities.

"Tubers, local food are actually abundant in our country. But unfortunately why do Indonesians like noodles made from wheat, even though wheat is a subtropical food," said Dedi.

He emphasized that Indonesia could diversify its food from noodles made from wheat, to noodles made from local foods such as cassava and sago.

"Replace wheat with tubers with cassava, with sago, with bananas. Replace mandarin oranges with Medan oranges, Pontianak oranges, and so on. Change granulated sugar to coconut sugar, palm sugar, or brown sugar, that's what we have to do , said Dedi.

He emphasized that Indonesia should boost local food from upstream to downstream, namely increasing productivity, downstreaming and processing it. "Because this is what will drive the processing of production," he said.