The Ministry Of Trade Suspects People Hoarding Cooking Oil Because Of Panic Buying, YLKI: It Must Be Proved Or Not!

Illustration. (Photo: Maria Trisnawati/VOI)

JAKARTA - Cooking oil has been in scarcity since the government took a policy to stabilize oil prices by setting the price to Rp. 14,000 thousand per liter in early 2022. This scarcity has made the Ministry of Trade suspect that people are panic buying and hoarding cooking oil.

In response to this, the daily administrator of the Indonesian Consumers Foundation (YLKI) Agus Suyanto asked the government to directly prove the statement.

"The statement from the Ministry of Trade needs to be proven whether hoarding actually occurs at the community level, it must be proven whether it really is happening in the community or at a higher level, for example at traders or distributors," Agus said when confirmed, Wednesday, March 9.

According to Agus, the allegation is unreasonable and strong enough considering the ability of the public as consumers to accommodate the cooking oil is not much. However, said Agus, the case is different if the community intends to resell the oil they have obtained.

"Because if at the community level how much the community can hoard, the consumer will not be able to hoard much when he is hoarding. Unless he is resold, it means he is not a consumer, not an end user. If he buys and then resells it means he is a seller," he said.

For that, according to Agus, what the government needs to pay attention to is ensuring that the distribution mechanism is right on target and does not cause panic in the community.

"So the government needs to pay attention to how the distribution mechanism can be right on target and there is no potential for panic buying and hoarding that must be considered," he said.

Similarly, member of Commission VI Andre Rosiade admitted that he was surprised by the statement from the Ministry of Trade (Kemendag) which stated that the scarcity of cooking oil was caused by the public stockpiling it. According to him, with the difficulty of getting cooking oil on the market, it is impossible for people to hoard it.

"The cooking oil just disappears, it's magical, how do people have access to hoard it," he said during a visual discussion, Tuesday, March 8.

Andre admits that he is worried that cooking oil will be increasingly difficult to obtain during the month of Ramadan. This is because the demand for cooking oil will soon increase entering the month of Ramadan. Not only from within the country, but also from Muslim-populated countries.

Therefore, Andre continued, the problem of scarcity of cooking oil is a homework (PR) that must be solved by the government.

"If tomorrow is the month of Ramadan, the item could really not be magical, I'm also confused about the language. This should be the government's homework," he said.

Previously reported, the Inspector General of the Ministry of Trade Didid Noordiatmoko explained that currently cooking oil production is approaching the need so that the shortage of this product should be resolved no later than the end of March 2022.

However, Didid said, a new problem arose which was the impact of rising prices and shortages of goods, namely panic buying. This is because the price of affordable cooking oil makes people buy more than they need.

In fact, said Didid, research results show that the need for cooking oil per person is only 0.8-1 liter per month. So with these results, many households are stocking cooking oil.