Indonesian corn output is likely to rise 24 percent this year because of an increase in harvested area and higher productivity, helping reduce imports of the commodity, a senior agriculture official said on Wednesday.
The country is expected to produce 15.9-16.5 million tonnes of corn in 2008, up from an estimated 13.29 million tonnes in 2007, Sutarto Alimoeso, director general of food crops at the agriculture ministry, said. "We have upgraded the target to meet rising demand and hopefully this year we don't need to import corn," Alimoeso told Reuters on the sidelines of a national corn conference. Initially, the government had set a production target of 13.88 million tonnes of corn this year.
Indonesia imports corn mainly from the United States to meet the demands of its animal feed industry. Data from Indonesia Corn Board showed that Indonesia imported 1.1 million tonnes of corn in 2007, the bulk of it from the United States. But output has been increasing since Indonesia began distributing free hybrid seeds in 2006, leading to a fall in imports.
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