July 12, 2011
Indonesia consumes 2.5-3 million cows annually
The amount of cattle consumption in Indonesia has reached 2.5 million to three million cows per year, according to Indonesian Agriculture Minister Suswono.
"Based on the latest census, we have some 15 million cows. We need about 2.5 million to three million cows for consumption at home. It seems we are able to meet our own need and do not need to import. We can achieve the target to be self sufficient in cows in 2014," the minister said on Friday (Jul 8).
He said that the government still had to import cows to meet domestic need because there were still constraints in the local distribution system.
"We still need some 10% as we could only meet 90% but when demand for meat is increasing, we have to choose the import option," the minister said.
He said that Indonesia's cattle import quota in 2011 totalled 600,000 so that it needed some 50 head of cows every month.
The government, he said was planning to import some 180,000 cows in the third quarter of this year from various countries which were free from foot and mouth diseases.
"We will evaluate it again whether we have to import or not because at present there were 140,000 supplies during the past one semester," the minister said.
He said it turned out that the need for meat of Indonesia was not affected by the Australian policy to temporarily stop its cattle exports to Indonesia.
"The fact is that Indonesia was not affected by the Australian cow export suspension. After all, the cattle census shows an encouraging result, though we have not yet collected the complete results of the census," Suswono said.
In the meantime, Chief Economic Minister Hatta Rajasa said that the need for meat at home in the face of the fasting month in August would increase to 35,333 tonnes per month, and it will jump up to 55,000 tonnes during the post-fasting month of Lebaran.
Meat production at home at present is about 26,342 tonnes per month so that the government would still carry out import, he said.
