Concerned With Corruption In Bansos Funds, PT Pertani's Financial Report Turns Out Of Loss

JAKARTA - Corruption in social assistance funds (bansos) with the suspect former Minister of Social Affairs Juliari Peter Batubara (JPB) also dragged PT Pertani into this mess.

The Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) in the near future plans to summon a PT Pertani official on behalf of Muslih as a witness in the JPB case for the social assistance program in the Jabodetabek area.

To note, PT Pertani is one of the state-owned enterprises (BUMN) which is engaged in the food sector, especially in terms of procurement and marketing of agricultural commodities, especially rice.

Quoting the company's latest financial report in 2018 on the official website, PT Pertani is said to have suffered a loss of IDR 81.3 billion. This value is much different from the 2017 period which still booked a net profit of IDR 25.5 billion.

In fact, the published financial statements stated that the company's revenue increased to IDR 1.77 trillion from the previous year IDR 1.74 trillion. Meanwhile, the pressure on profit is estimated to occur due to the cost of revenue which rose to IDR 1.66 trillion from the previous IDR 1.55 trillion.

This condition then has an impact on the decline in company assets. Until the close of the 2018 business year, PT Pertani reported that the company's assets had decreased from the previous Rp1.43 trillion in 2017 to Rp1.23 trillion.

For information, in mid-2020 PT Pertani was widely reported as one of the SOEs that was less productive because it was considered unable to contribute maximally to the formation of dividends for the state. In fact, the name of this company was discussed in a government working meeting, represented by the Minister of BUMN Erick Thohir, with Commission VI of the DPR-RI.

Reportedly, the meeting itself was held after Finance Minister Sri Mulyani touched on the issue of state-owned companies which continue to suffer from loss problems. PT Pertani's own minor performance was allegedly due to business inefficiency, loan interest expense, and changes in government policies in the seed procurement mechanism.