M

em>March 8, Online/Antara

President Susilo Bambang Yu-dhoyono said that every country in the world protected their farmers
despite anti-protectionist regulations.

“Indeed, there are WTO [World Trade Organization] anti-protectionist rules and in G20 meetings we also always say we are anti-protectionist. But in reality, all countries take sides one way or another. In the case of agriculture, they side with the farmers. Therefore, conflicts, clashes or disputes can happen,” he said in Budapest on Thursday night.

Your comments:

It is so sad to hear of the Indonesia’s agriculture has not been able to compete.

We even order rice from neighboring countries like Thailand, Vietnam or India.

We have a hectare of land that farmers can use but no effort from the government to improve it.

Wake up, agriculture minister.

Prabu

Despite the intention to help, Indonesia seem to do more harm than good trying to increase the productivity of its farmers.

Purchasing rice abroad and selling it at dumping prices really affects domestic farmers’ incentive.

Lars Andersen

This time I agree with Yudhoyono. I see how other countries “creatively” protect their markets from cheaper imported products to protect their local producers. In this case we are just losing in this kind of “creativity”. But the objectives are the same.

Remember how the US tried to prevent palm oil becoming bio fuel raw materials?

I believed it was to make sure that the materials used were their locally produced ones.

I believe we need to protect our farmers and teach them how to compete, improving their productivity and efficiency. Protection is needed at the early stage.

Rio Rivai

Isn’t it more efficient in the long run to see why it’s cheaper to produce abroad, and then import to Indonesia?

The government already treats farmers like children unable to compete in the real world by providing subsidized fertilizer and other benefits. Why do we produce less at higher expense?

We have good soil, cheap labor and the weather for agriculture.

Deddy K.

Protectionism is sort of OK so long as it’s done short term and alongside improvement activities — I do not see much evidence of that. Hence the word protect should be changed to subsidize.

In reality it is buying the farmers’ votes and does nothing for the long- term prospects.

Duncan