Wednesday 16 September 2009

Proposes Budget for National Cacao Movement 2010 Rp. 1 Trillion

The Department of Agriculture proposed that budget for the National Movement of Kakao Production and Quality Development [Gernas Kakao] be increased. For 2009, the budget for Gernas Kakao Movement was Rp. 983.711 billion, whilst for 2010 the Ministry of Agriculture proposed the amount of Rp. 1 trillion.

Rizki Muis, Director of Spices Plantations and Freshener [TRP], the Directorate of plantation, Department of Agriculture disclosed this to Business News in Jakarta, Wednesday [7/9]. The Proposal for Kakao National Movement [Garnas Kakao] for 2010 was still to be discussed with Commission IV of Parliament, because the fund was derived from the budget of the Ministry Finance 2010.

In the National Kakao Movement [Garnas] the Government took three actions i.e. rehabilitation, rejuvenation, and intensification up to 2011. The Government sets target of rehabilitation of people’s cacao plantation covering 450 thousand ha specified as follows: rejuvenated land 70 thousand ha, rehabilitation 235 thousand ha and intensification around 145 ha.

The National cacao Movement 2009 made evaluations which concluded that the rehabilitation program had been successfully carried out due to favourable weather where the rainy season had not come. If the rainy season had come rehabilitation of plantations would be difficult. So far the rehabilitation had been carried out by way of side connection on old plants with premium clones.

To exercise this rehabilitation plan, up till now the premium seeds produced by Center of Coffee and Cacao Rehabilitation [Puslikoka] Jember was still at distribution stage. Report from the regions disclosed that around 1 million seeds were spread out to the Gernas Cacao operation zones. “The El Nino long drought would hopefully not affect the process of planting new seeds”.

In 2008, the Government designated 40 regencies in 9 provinces which were to be the target of Gernas Cacao national movement campaign, i.e. : South Sulawesi, West Sulawesi, Southeast Sulawesi, Central Sulawesi, Bali, East Nusa Tenggara, Maluku, West Papua and Papua.

Meanwhile, intensification by way of fertilizing were admittedly not running well, since the fertilizers to be distributed had not arrived yet. Hopefully by October next fertilizing could be exercised so that the intensification process should not be hindranced. For this, support of the provincial government was called for.

With this program the Government expected productivity of people’s cacao could be back to normal, reaching 1.5 tons/ha. This will bring positive impact to national cacao production for the next 2 or 3 years; national cacao production was projected at 1.3 to 1.5 million tons. “Presently a good number of plants were infected by pest so that cacao plantation productivity was only 500-600 kg/ha”.

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