JAKARTA: Indonesia may not import rice in 2025, Zulkifli Hasan, a senior minister overseeing food affairs, said on Monday.
Indonesia’s rice output is estimated to fall 2.43% this year to 30.34 million metric tons, due to a delay in planting and the harvest season after dry weather in 2023, the statistics bureau said last month.
Indonesia’s rice imports have jumped in the past two years, reaching over 3 million metric tons each year.
Zulkifli told reporters that if imports were needed it would likely be a small amount of rice, depending on supplies, and some of this year’s import allocation that cannot be delivered would be carried over into next year.
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The Southeast Asian country aims to import up to 3.6 million tons of rice this year.
It also plans to open between 750,000 hectares and 1 million hectares (1.85 million acres and 2.47 million acres) of new rice fields in 2025 to achieve President Prabowo Subianto’s target of food self-reliance.
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