Panen Padi, Ganjar Pranowo Targets Rice Prices In Central Java Stable

Ganjar Pranowo hopes that the price of rice will stabilize. (IST)

The rice harvest in Central Java has started in several areas. The Governor of Central Java, Ganjar Pranowo hopes that the start of the rice harvest season will help stabilize rice prices this week so that inflation can be controlled.

"Now we check, based on existing data and information, it turns out that we have started harvesting. Our office, I ask to map all of Central Java, the potential that has been harvested anywhere. Just walked here, there is a report from Kebumen that it has started to harvest. Well, I'll look at it later," said Ganjar after reviewing the rice harvest in Krengseng Village, Gringsing District, Batang Regency, Saturday, February 11.

Rice harvest in Batang Regency has started since the last few days. However, the bad weather factor is still an obstacle. The price of rice or dry grain is relatively high, and makes farmers happy.

According to Ganjar Pranowo, such harvest conditions must be managed properly together. The weather problem, which is an obstacle when drying rice, can be overcome using a drying machine. After that, Ganjar asked that all Penen costs be recalculated to become rice.

"This farmer is happy, so it must be managed properly. I ask to recalculate how much it costs. Starting from dry grain harvests, then to dry mills, to rice prices. In this way, we can actually calculate everything," he said.

Calculation of the harvest price into rice, plus the calculation of rice yields in all regions will be used as a reference for measuring rice stocks in the market. Ganjar predicts that in one week the market conditions have been flooded with rice and inflation will be controlled.

"If we start harvesting today, the processing experience starts from those who bought the grain earlier, it will take approximately one week, so actually we can calculate how much the harvest area is, in the next week there will be how much grain, how much rice is there. In fact, the market can already be flooded. So in the context of inflation, this should have started to be under control," explained the governor for the two periods.

The next step, after the market is flooded with rice stocks and can lower prices in the market today, what is needed is to keep prices from falling. According to Ganjar, the price limit for rice and rice must be maintained above the HPP of Rp4,300. Currently, the price purchased from farmers is around Rp5,500-Rp5,600. The price is considered high for farmers.

"The harvest dry grain price is now IDR 5,500-IDR 5,600. It's high, you know, it's good. But after the harvest, it could go down, so we can hold it from touching the HPP of IDR 4,300 or below. The decline must be reasonable, this needs to be maintained," said Ganjar.

Ganjar also asked Bulog to quickly absorb rice or rice yields from farmers so that rice price stabilization can be carried out immediately. Thus, there is no longer any reason for high prices due to flooding. Because from the results of monitoring rice prices in the market in the last two days, traders admitted that rice prices had risen because distributors were hampered by weather and flooding.

"The method is to be faster, friends from Bulog are also ready so that price stabilization can be done quickly. So if the stories are local that say floods and high prices, we can show that the rice is not flooded now and don't use excuses," said Ganjar Pranowo.