KKP Reaches Agreement With FDA, Thousands Of Shrimp Containers From The Republic Of Indonesia May Enter The US

JAKARTA - The Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries (KKP) has reached a dispensation agreement with the Food and Drug Supervisory Agency (FDA) regarding the shipment of shrimp from Indonesia.

Thousands of containers containing shrimp from Indonesia on their way are allowed to enter the United States (US).

The agreement was reached on October 18, local time, after a series of intensive negotiations following the issuance of a new import policy by the US government, namely Import Alert (IA) 99-52, which will take effect from Friday, October 31.

Head of the Indonesian Marine and Fisheries Product Quality Control and Supervision Agency, Ishartini, said that after going through several intensive negotiations in a special forum with the FDA, high-level policy makers finally gave approval for the entry of thousands of shrimp containers from Indonesia.

"After several negotiations, they decided to allow thousands of shrimp containers from Indonesia who are on their way and will arrive in the US after October 31, 2025," said Ishartini in his official statement, quoted Monday, October 20.

IA 99-52 is a policy issued by the FDA which stipulates strict supervision of shrimp products from Indonesia, especially from the Java and Lampung regions, to ensure that there is no radioactive exposure to Cesium-137.

The policy came into effect on October 31, 2025 and required every product from the affected region to be equipped with an official Cesium-137 exposure-free certificate issued by competent authorities in Indonesia before being able to enter Uncle Sam's market.

The IA 99-52 policy had raised concerns among export businesses and national shrimp industry stakeholders.

The reason is that when the regulation was announced, there were thousands of containers of Indonesian shrimp on their way and it was estimated that they would arrive within the stipulated deadline, without additional documents required by the new regulations.

"We managed to convince the FDA that as many as more than 1,000 shrimp containers will arrive in the US above October 31, it has gone through a quality assurance process and is equipped with a Quality Certificate (SMKHP) issued by the KKP," he said.

He said, upon arrival in the US, all containers of shrimp will still undergo examination by the FDA to ensure that there is no contamination of radioactive Cesium-137, in accordance with applicable regulations.

"A similar examination is also applied to shrimp containers that enter before October 31," he concluded.

To note, in August 2025, the FDA detected Cs-137 contamination of frozen shrimp products exported by PT Bahari Makmur Sejati (BMS).

The company is one of the largest suppliers in the US and is recorded to have shipped 38 million kilograms of shrimp this year.

Not only that, but the FDA also detected Cs-137 contamination of spice products from the Republic of Indonesia.

In a report published by the FDA, exposure to Cesium-137 radioactive substances was detected in the cloves sent by the company PT Natural Java Spice to California.

Based on these findings, the FDA then blocked the import of all spices from PT Natural Java Spices (NJS).

The FDA emphasized that it will tighten supervision of all products from Indonesia, both spices and seafood.

All products from the two Indonesian companies will remain detained until there is evidence of improvement.

In fact, it is possible that the ban list will be expanded if new violations of products from Indonesia are found.