Jakarta, The Indonesia Post – The Minister of Agriculture of the Republic of Indonesia, Syahrul Yasin Limpo, said that the export trend of Swallow’s Nest (SBW) has shown a significant increase in the last five years.
The house of the swallow or Collocalia sp, It is believed to have health benefits and is widely produced in Java, Kalimantan to Sulawesi.
“This is a gift from God for us, without special care, swallow contributes to foreign exchange and income for farmers,” said the Minister of Agriculture, Sahrul Yasin Limpo (SYL) in Jakarta (15/1).
The Minister of Agriculture, SYL, is grateful that this commodity from the livestock sub-sector has also received support from the Minister of Trade, M. Lutfi. Support for the SBW commodity was delivered when launching the Indonesian Store (IDNStore) Digital Trade Platform on Thursday (14/1) in Jakarta.
Minister M. Lutfi stated his confidence in achieving the targeted growth of the National Medium Term Development Plan (RPJMN) and SBW export commodities became a mainstay, even as a “treasure”.
For information, from the data on the quarantine system, IQFAST’s Agricultural Quarantine Agency (Barantan) noted that during the Covid 19 period, the number of SBW exports was 1,155 tons with a value of Rp. 28.9 trillion or an increase of 2.13% from the achievement in 2019 which was only 1,131.2 valued at Rp. 28.3 trillion only.
“Apart from sunshine, fertile land and many more that the Almighty Ruler has given to this nation, we must protect it, we must manage it,” said the Minister of Agriculture.
SBW can live well with a well-maintained ecosystem, ranging from forests, seas and rivers as natural swallow feed producers. Currently, SBW traded is a commodity under the guidance of the Directorate General of Animal Husbandry and Animal Health (PKH), Ministry of Agriculture for productivity.
Meanwhile, for export assistance, starting from harmonizing the rules and technical requirements for sanitation of the destination country and technical guidance on sanitation and food safety, the food safety is carried out by Barantan.
Still according to the Minister of Agriculture SYL, through Barantan, his party has provided assistance to 23 exporters of Indonesian SBW so that they have been successfully registered by the Chinese agricultural quarantine authority, GACC (General Administration of Customs of the People’s Republic of China).
And it was recorded that as many as 262 tons or 23% of the total exports of Indonesian SBW were purchased by China.
As the largest exporter of SBW in the world, many Indonesian business actors are targeting the Chinese market because the selling price is higher than other destination countries, which is between Rp. 25 million to Rp. 40 million per kilo.
However, with this higher price, in particular China also requires registration requirements for swallow nest processing sites in addition to meeting technical requirements of course.
Meanwhile, it is known that swallow nest processing facilities also require a large enough workforce or are labor intensive, so that they can provide an economic impact in the form of employment opportunities for the surrounding community.
“We are currently assisting 13 other swallow nest processing businesses to penetrate the Chinese market, hopefully we can support it together so that this year is over,” said SYL again.
RI Swallow’s Nest Selling Abroad The Head of Barantan, Ali Jamil who also gave a statement said that apart from China, there were 23 other export destination countries for SBW RI, including Australia, USA, Canada, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Africa and others.
“Each destination country has its own export protocol and we, as the quarantine authorities, guard the technical requirements,” said Jamil.
Jamil also said that his party had a testing laboratory that had been recognized by trading partner countries. In addition to accelerating services, his party also continues to innovate quarantine technology to facilitate international trade in agriculture.
Jamil again added, the participation and support of the agricultural service, breeders and the community in maintaining the sustainability of the SBW commodity is needed.
One of them is against the threat of bird flu or avian influenza (AI). We have experienced it in 2005 and it takes a long effort to control it, he said.
“Together we are on guard, report the passing of poultry, especially to quarantine officers so that SBW can still contribute to the recovery of the national economy,” said Jamil. (ray/bbs)
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