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Indonesian chicken product manufacturer ships first export to Japan
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A container is unloaded onto a truck to be transported to a ship during the inauguration of a new international container export route from the port of Kuala Tanjung in Batubara regency, North Sumatra, on March 28, 2020. (JP/ Apriadi Gunawan)
F
ood company PT Malindo Food Delight launched on Tuesday its first export to Japan amid declining global trade due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
Malindo Food Delight shipped 6 tons of chicken products including nuggets and sausages worth Rp 156 million (US$10,597) to the East Asian country.
The company produces 9,000 tons of such products each year, contributing 4 percent to the revenue of its parent company, PT Malindo Feedmill.
“I hope this export can give extraordinary energy to us and all the parties in seeking other export opportunities,” Lau Joo Hwa, the director of the parent company, said in a virtual presser on Tuesday.
“This is also our effort to support the Agriculture Ministry’s movement in raising exports threefold.”
The coronavirus outbreak has hit international trade amid movement restrictions implemented in various countries around the world, including in Indonesia. The World Trade Organization (WTO) projects global trade volumes will contract by between 13 percent at best and 32 percent at worst this year.
Indonesia’s overall exports were down 9.9 percent year-on-year (yoy) to $13.73 billion in July as the COVID-19 outbreak hampered global logistics, according to Statistics Indonesia (BPS) data.
However, agriculture exports rose to $350 million in July, an 11.17 percent yoy increase from the figure in the same month last year.
Agriculture Minister Syahrul Yasin Limpo said Tuesday Malindo Food Delight’s maiden export proved that Indonesian chicken products could penetrate Japan’s market, which demanded high quality food products.
“The target is raising it tenfold,” said Syahrul, a NasDem party politician. “I hope we can maintain consistency in quality and efficiency so that we can keep competing in the international market.”
The minister went on to say that companies like Malindo Food Delight should buy more chickens from local farmers to help stabilize prices.
