RI Has The Largest Sago Land In The World, But Exports Lose To Malaysia

Minister of Industry Agus Gumiwang Kartasasmita. (Photo: Theresia Agatha/VOI)

JAKARTA - Indonesia is the country with the largest sago land area in the world. Of the 6.5 million hectares (ha) of the world's sago land, about 5.5 million ha or 85 percent are in Indonesia.

Even though it has the widest land, the Indonesian sago export is still inferior to Malaysia.

Currently, the world's largest sago regent exporter is Malaysia with 15 million US dollars in 2023.

Meanwhile, Indonesia, which is in second place, can only reap an export value of 9 million US dollars in the same year.

"The value in my opinion is still very small. I hope that this potential that has not been utilized can be utilized by all stakeholders, especially to open, create and fill the national and international sago markets for actors involved in Indonesian sago agribusiness," said Minister of Industry Agus Gumiwang Kartasasmita in his remarks at the National Symposium of Sago Processing Industry at the Ministry of Industry Building, Jakarta, Monday, July 29.

Based on research data from Bisnis Research Insight, the growth of the sago mart market globally is projected to grow to reach 560 million US dollars by 2031.

In the context of developing sago processing, the government has made the national sago processing improvement program a priority program for the 2020-2024 National Medium-Term Development Plan (RPJMN).

"The disbursement of the sago industry is expected not only to stop at the sago regent, but also to spur the growth of other downstream products. Sago can be processed into various products ranging from food products, such as noodles, analogous rice and non-food products such as bio packaging," said Agus.

"Strengthening research is expected to support the development of sago downstreaming," he continued.

Agus added that his party is committed to increasing the downstream development of sago through the development of product diversification, facilitation of cooperation between the processing industry and users, encouraging the Domestic Component Level certification program (TKDN) as well as the machine and equipment restructuring program for the sago processing industry.

"The Ministry of Industry seeks to always synergize with other stakeholders from the center and regions as a step to encourage the acceleration of the development of the sago processing industry," he added.