Agricom.id, JAKARTA - 245 food plantation price supervisors or Pelayanan Informasi Pasar (PIP) officers from General Directorate of Food Plantation Ministry of Agriculture are prepared to coordinate and make the same ways heading to paddy and corn crops in 2021.

Central Bureau of Statistic (CBS) officially released the fix production numbers of paddy in 2020 reaching 54,65 million tons of milled dry grain (MDG), or increased 45,17 thousand tons or 0,08 percent compared to 2019 which reached 54,60 million tons of MDG. If conversed to rice for consumption, the rice production in 2020 would be 31,33 million tons, increased 21,46 thousand tons or 0,07 percent than 2019 which reached 31,31 million tons.

Besides the production potential in January – April 2021 could be 14,54 million tons of rice or increases 3,08 million tons (26,84 percent) compared to rice production in the same period last year which reached 11,46 million tons.

It is predicted that the crop peak would be in March to April. In March, it would cover about 1,64 million hectares of paddy field and in April, it would cover 1,67 million hectares. Corn crops would be about 700 thousand in this month. So it needs maximal efforts from PIP officers to monitor the price issue in the field during the massive harvests.

“The goal to monitor paddy price namely the MDG and corn is to control the price so that the farmers get benefits,” Director of Process and Plantation Production Marketing General Directorate of Food Plantation Ministry of Agriculture, Gatut said, Tuesday, as in the official statement to Agricomi.id.

He also mentioned that Ministry of Agriculture would always monitor the price issue as the anticipation if the price gets more expensive or cheaper.

The advantage of data reported by PIP officers is that the data is the selling price from the farmers and it is real time. Besides, the data would consist of information, coordination of location, name, phone numbers of the product owners, quality and quantity of the products reported.

“The PIP officer would report the data online through the price application in android and it would be processed in computer and provided in graphic, table, and others,” Gatut said.

For example, paddy price from District of Lampung Utara which was reported was MDG from Sub district of Abung Timur. MDG was Rp. 4.275 per kilogram within water content 21%. The owner is Mister Mustofa, phone number 082375953xxx and the coordinate LAT -4.79907511111111 and LNG - 104.998176555556.

PIP officers are in di 245 district/cities of food plantation centers in Indonesia. They should monitor and report the farmers’ selling price of food plantation commodity in every single day and online to General Directorate of Plantation. The commodities to report are paddy, corn, soybean, bean, green bean, cassava where the officers work.

General Director of Food Plantation Ministry of Agriculture, Suwandi told that the PIP officers have the important role to know the food plantation price in the field and they could report to us in real time to know what to do.

“Just like what Minister Syahul Yasin Limpo told, we have to do anticipation heading to the massive harvest. One thing to do is by urging the active roles of PIP officers to know the real price in the field and the central government could monitor directly,” he said. (A2)