Indian Termination Of Rice Exports Does Not Affect Indonesia, Bulog Boss Reveals Alternative Countries

President Director of the Public Company of the Logistics Affairs Agency (Perum Bulog) Budi Waseso. (Photo: Doc. Antara)

JAKARTA - The President Director of the Public Logistics Agency (Perum Bulog) Budi Waseso ensured that the Indian government's decision to stop rice exports had no effect on Indonesia. According to the man who is familiarly called Buwas, Indonesia does not depend on one country alone.

"We don't have to depend on a country, the important thing is that the rice is good, the price is good, the quality is good, and the taste is the same as the taste in Indonesia," Buwas told the media crew at the DPR RI Building, Wednesday, August 16.

If India stops its rice exports, continued Buwas, Indonesia still has several alternative countries such as Thailand, Vietnam, and Myanmar.

"Now there are also Laos, there are also Cambodia, Pakistan. So there is no problem," he said

He also explained that currently Bulog has secured 1.3 million tons of imported rice from the total quota this year of 2 million tons. Meanwhile, the rest, he said, will be imported in stages according to domestic needs.

"This has come, for our stock, it has reached 1.3 million tons from 2 million tons, we have controlled it," continued Buwas.

Just so you know, the Indian government issued a policy to prohibit non-Basmati rice exports. This policy took effect from last July 20 as an effort to prevent the surge in India's domestic rice price.

On a separate occasion, Head of the National Food Agency (NFA) Arief Prasetyo Adi stated that this would not significantly affect national food security conditions.

Furthermore, Arief said the government had prepared various steps to maintain supply stability and rice prices.

"We will make sure that Indonesia has sufficient stock, the calculation of carry-over from 2022 to 2023 is around 4 million tons, then from the KSA (Regional Sample Framework) we have production of more than 2.8 million tons in May, so we are optimistic that rice is safe," he said, in Jakarta, written Tuesday, July 25.