Erick Thohir's Kick Help Solve Cooking Oil Scarcity Problems: BUMN And Private Must Get Together

Minister of SOEs, Erick Thohir. (Photo: Doc. Ministry of SOEs)

JAKARTA - Cooking oil is in short supply and only soars. The Ministry of State-Owned Enterprises (BUMN) did not remain silent about the problems that occurred in the country. One way to do this is by diverting CPO production to cooking oil.

SOE Minister Erick Thohir said the SOE's strategy to help with the cooking oil problem was to shift the production of CPO, which is not used for cooking oil, to cooking oil. Then also followed by market operations.

"Switching a quarter of our production, which was not cooking oil, has been moved. We operate the market. Enough? No. That's why from the start we knocked out private friends whose plantations are 56 percent," he said during the CNBC Indonesia Economic Outlook, Tuesday, March 22.

Erick assessed that the problem of cooking oil scarcity could be overcome by increasing cooperation between BUMN and the private sector. This is because SOEs only have a plantation area of 4 percent and their contribution is only 7 percent.

Furthermore, Erick said that the economy can accelerate if there is harmony. In this case, the acceleration of the pace of the economy requires cooperation between the government, SOEs and the private sector.

"Come on, let's go back like this, if the name of our economy is growing, there needs to be harmony. That's what we knock on. If it's difficult we need help too, we must," he said.

For your information, the price of cooking oil has continued to increase since the end of 2021. At the beginning of this year, the government had implemented a single cooking oil price of Rp. 14,000. However, this policy makes cooking oil difficult to obtain.

In February 2022, the government again issued a policy of the Highest Retail Price or HET for bulk cooking oil of Rp. 11,500 per liter and packaged cooking oil of Rp. 14,000 per liter.

Since the enactment of the policy, the scarcity of cooking oil is still happening. In fact, the market price was found to be much higher than the HET set by the Ministry of Trade.

Finally, as of last Wednesday, March 13, the government raised the HET for bulk cooking oil to Rp. 14,000 per liter and the government also revoked the HET for packaged cooking oil. This means that packaged cooking oil is released in accordance with market mechanisms.

In its development, the Minister of Trade (Mendag) Muhammad Lutfi said that the supply of cooking oil should be sufficient for the people in each province. However, he smells that there are speculators playing in the scarcity of supply and the high price of cooking oil in the country. This has made the price of cooking oil at the consumer level volatile.

Based on BPS data as of February 2022, the price of packaged oil from the original Rp. 20,279 per liter to Rp. 16,965 per liter, decreased by 18.9 percent. Meanwhile, bulk oil decreased from 17,726 per liter to IDR 15,583 per liter or 10.1 percent. However, in fact these prices do not apply in the market.

In fact, Lutfi continued, the government has distributed 551 million liters from 720 million liters throughout Indonesia. According to him, it should have met the needs of the people in each province.

"What happened is, our speculation is that there are people who shouldn't accept the proceeds from this oil. For example, entering an industrial area where 1.8 million tons per month should be sent to the public or being smuggled out of the country. This is a mafia that we must eradicate. together," he said in a Working Meeting with Commission VI of the DPR RI, Thursday, March 17.

Lutfi revealed that there are three areas suspected of hoarding cooking oil, including Medan, North Sumatra (Sumut); Surabaya, East Java (East Java); DKI Jakarta. For Sumatra itself, as of February 14 to March 16, cooking oil supply was 60,423,417 liters.

"I went without a migraine, there are three areas similar to this, namely Surabaya, East Java with 91 million distribution, Jakarta 85 million with 11 million people and North Sumatra," he said.