32 Thousands Of Paddy Fields Submerged By Flood, Bulog: Harvest In Several Regions Of Indonesia Will Be Backward!

Illustration. (Photo: Unsplash)

JAKARTA - Heavy rains that have occurred in the last few days have flooded 32 thousand rice fields in several regions in Indonesia. The impact of this flood will affect harvest time.

Director of Supply Chain and Public Service of Perum Bulog, Mokhamad Suyamto, said that the flooded rice fields did not significantly affect the stock of rice availability. Because, rice is still safe until the end of the year.

Based on BPS data, said Mokhamad, at the end of the year the amount of food stock was around 7 million tons. He said, when compared with the average monthly demand of 2 million tons, the stock is very sufficient.

"Moreover, this March has started to enter the main harvest. So of course the stock in the community will continue to increase along with the arrival of the harvest which will start later in March and April 2021," he said, in Jakarta, Wednesday, February 24.

Even though the stock is safe, said Mokhamad, flooding in rice fields will affect harvest time in flood-affected areas. When a flood occurred, he admitted that he immediately went straight to Karawang, Cirebon and Subang. The affected rice fields are only one month old for planting.

"The impact is not significant (to the rice stock), but there will be a setback for the main harvest period which will be (conducted) in April or July," he explained.

Mokhamad said, this is actually beneficial for farmers. This is because when the harvest is carried out simultaneously, the selling price of grain will be cheaper. Meanwhile, if the harvest is delayed, the price will be higher.

"In fact, it is more beneficial to price stability at the farmer level, because of what? Harvesting is delayed, not all of the peak harvests are in March so the price received by farmers that they harvest will be higher," he said.