A fisherman dries fish at Kuala Jambi in East Tanjung Jabung, Jambi province, on Friday (28/7). The income of fishermen in the area have been affected by the scarcity and high prices of salt. In order to continue the local salted fish processing business, farmers have been forced to cut the prices of their products. For example, gulama salted fish, which was previously sold at Rp 4,000 (30 US cents) per kilogram, is now valued only at Rp 2,500 to Rp 3,000 per kg.
PALEMBANG, KOMPAS – The shortage of edible salt and industrial salt across Indonesia is not yet resolved. As many industry players closed their factories as a result of the shortage, the government has finally decided on importing raw salt.
Head of the National Police’s food task force Insp. Gen. Setyo Wasisto confirmed the decision in Palembang, South Sumatra, on Friday (28/7).
Setyo said the shortage and spiking prices of salt was occurring not only in Palembang, but also in almost all regions, because of the falling salt production in East Java and East Nusa Tenggara. In addition, the arrest of state-owned salt producer PT Garam’s president director, for selling industrial salt as edible salt,had negatively impacted market psychology.
As import tax is not levied on industrial salt,selling it as edible salt at a higher price would reap profits for Garam.
The current price of edible salt has increased from Rp 700 per kilogram to Rp 3,000 per kg.
“We and related agencies will continue monitoring the fluctuation of salt prices,” Setyo said.
Importing from Australia
PT Garam production director Budi Sasongko said that in response to the salt shortage, the government would be importing edible salt from Australia.
The imported edible salts hould meet with criteria such as having a minimum sodium chlorate (NaCl) content of 97 percent. The importation plan is to be realized no later than Aug. 10, 2017.
“For a short [import]period, Australia is the most prepared,” he said.
Earlier in April, PT Garam imported 75,000 tons of edible salt. Of this amount, 55,000 tons was imported from Australia and 20,000 tons from India.
The port of entry for the imported edible salt will be the three seaports of Tanjung Perak Port (Surabaya), Ciwandan Port (Banten) and Belawan Port (Medan).
“According to the plan, the edible salt will arrive at the ports and it will be unloaded directly at the [salt production] factories or at the small-to-medium industries (SMEs) that have the import allocation. If is is unloaded at PT Garam, distribution would take time,” Budi said.
Separately, foreign trade director general Oke Nurwan said PT Garam would be responsible for importing the edible salt. The salt should enter Indonesia no later than Aug. 10, 2017, and be prioritized for distribution to SMEs. The government will set the selling price for SMEs and consumers after it receives pricing details from the salt exporting country.
“We decided to import the edible salt because national salt production has dropped drastically. This is an extraordinary situation so it does not breach the salt import regulation, which stipulates that salt imports are not allowed in the one to two months preceding a salt harvest,” he said.
Importing edible salt will be the first stage of efforts to address the shortage. If it is necessary, PT Garam can propose another import. The salt import aims to fulfill the national consumption of 226,000 tons.
Director general of maritime spatial management Brahmantyo Satyamurti Poerwadi of the Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Ministry said national salt production had decreased drastically this year. The total volume of salt produced by salt farmers and PT Garam in the May-June period was a mere 6,200 tons,when average production is 166,000 tons per month under normal conditions. The sharp fall in production was caused by the weather anomaly of unseasonal high rainfall in salt-producing regions.
Production increase
Surabaya Food Security and Agriculture Agency head Djoestamadji said the city had run out of its salt stock a week ago. The 1,429-ton stock was last year’s production volume, which was only 1.5 percent of the local consumption of 100,000 tons. To obtain new supplies and stock for next year, Djoestamadji said, salt production had to be increased despite uncertain weather conditions. He suggested that the implementation of new production technologies would be a good solution.
Surabaya’s salt production has continued to decrease over the last three years, and had dropped from 117,600 tons in 2014to 86,227 tons in 2015,and then to 1,429 tons in 2016.
In Cirebon, West Java, the unpredictable weather over the past few days was expected to disrupt the local salt production. Cirebon remained cloudy through Friday, and the evaporation ponds at a salt farm in Pengenan district were full of water. Meanwhile, the overcast weather and the light rains of the previous day meant that farmers were unable to harvest salt.
“If the weather continues like this, we cannot guarantee that salt production will continue,” said Mohammad Taufik, chairman of the Indonesian Salt Farmers Association’s West Java branch. The salt farmers use the traditional method of producing salt, which relies on natural evaporation by the sun.
According to the Cirebon Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Agency, the volume of salt produced by a total 3,010 hectares of salt farms stood at 795 tons as of July. The “wet drought” experienced in 2016 also disrupted the local production of edible salt,which produced a total of only 1,640 tons.
