The Government Prepares 1 Million Ha Lands To Plant Etanol Raw Materials

JAKARTA - The government is preparing a roadmap for the use of ethanol as a mixture of fuel oil (BBM) of 10 percent. 1 million hectares of land (ha) will also be prepared to grow ethanol raw materials.

The raw materials for ethanol come from sugar cane, cassava, to corn. This commodity will be developed to support the plan to use ethanol as a mixture of fuel.

Minister of Agriculture (Mentan), Andi Amran Sulaiman said that he is ready to support the government's long-term vision is to make ethanol a source of energy for the future.

Amran admitted that he was coordinating with the Ministry of Agrarian Affairs and Spatial Planning/National Land Agency (ATR/BPN) in determining the location to be used to grow ethanol raw materials.

"Etanol, remind me, ethanol plans to depend on my friend Gus Nusron (Minister of ATR). There is land, we are ready to plant. There is a President Director (Bulog) here. I brought this, he is ready to plant 1 million hectares," he said at the Town Hall Meeting for One Year at the Coordinating Ministry for Food, Jakarta, Tuesday, October 21.

Amran said that the planting of ethanol raw materials must be fully prepared to the micro management. He said the commodities of ethanol raw materials to be planted were also diverse.

The source has 2 ethanols, first is sweet potatoes, 1 million hectares of cassava have been prepared. Tebu, we designed 500,000 (hectares) of these two to be ethanol," he said.

Separately, the Coordinating Minister for Food Zulkifli Hasan said that the policy of using ethanol as a mixture of 10 percent gasoline will contribute to the interest of farmers in planting cassava. At the same time, the government can absorb more cassava production in the country.

"There will be no more vacant land. Because every land later one hectare can give an income of Rp. 80 million one year. Now why can't it be? Because no one buys it," he said.

Zulhas, as he is familiarly called, said that farmers would flock to plant cassava if the production results could be absorbed as raw materials for ethanol and methanol.

"If tomorrow we are ethanol and methanol, the factory that buys it is there. Every day we use gasoline. So people will plant it because someone buys it," he said.

According to Zulhas, to produce one liter of ethanol, it takes at least 6 kilograms (kg) of cassava as raw material.

With the increase in demand in line with the use of ethanol as a mixture of fuel, Zulhas continued, the price of cassava will also increase by around Rp. 1,500 per kg from the current price of Rp. 1,300 per kg.

Therefore, Zulhas also believes that there will be no vacant land. This is because farmers will use their land to grow commodities that become raw materials for ethanol.

"So there will be no vacant land. If you plant corn, plant cassava, everything will be planted. Because everything is valuable and everything will give income," he said.