East Kalimantan Exports Depok Banana Worth IDR 5.57 Billion

Pisang kepok gerecek in East Kalimantan Province. ANTARA/HO-DPTPH Kaltim

SAMARINDA - East Kalimantan Province (Kaltim) exports gerecek kepok bananas to various destination countries from January to March 2023 to reach Rp5.57 billion, such as exports to the United States, Pakistan, Malaysia, Singapore, and exports to Iran.

"To support banana exports, we have also developed a banana area center, especially gerecek kepok banana in East Kutai Regency in 2021 covering an area of 75 hectares (ha)," said Head of Horticulture for the Food, Food Crops and Horticulture (DPTPH) Province of East Kalimantan Kosasih, in Samarinda as reported by ANTARA, Monday, May 15.

In that year, the East Kalimantan DPTPH helped seeds as many as 27,000 polybags, herbisides as much as 385 liters, and agricultural lime as much as 80 kg, so thanks to this assistance, the banana crop land in the East Kutai area continued to grow.

In 2023, his party also allocated assistance for 18 thousand kepok gerecek banana tree seedlings to farmers spread across three districts, so that banana farming land would expand.

Banana kepok gerecek is a local kepok banana variant from East Kutai Regency. This Pisang is popular in a number of countries because it has a distinctive sweet taste and has a soft texture.

The East Kalimantan DPTPH continues to develop gerecek kepok bananas because its market opportunities are very promising both for local, national, and global markets.

Meanwhile, the details of the export value of the kepok banana up to March, which amounted to Rp5.57 billion, were in January 2023 exports to Singapore worth Rp640 million, to Malaysia Rp404 million, to Pakistan Rp480 million.

"In February, exports to Singapore amounted to Rp320 million, to Malaysia worth Rp504 million, to Iran Rp711 million, in March exports to Singapore Rp640 million, to Malaysia Rp672 million, to Pakistan Rp480 million, and exports of kepok bananas to the United States with a value of Rp624 million," said Kosasihpula.