Indonesian agriculture ministry forecast the country's rice outputs (hulled rice production) to be surplus by 4.2 million ton this year despite a decline in production of un-hulled rice, a senior official said here on Wednesday.
This is the country's first of its three forecasts of rice production in a year, which expected the production of the un- hulled rice was estimated at 69.871 million ton in 2014, scaling down from 71.28 million ton in 2013, said Haryono, acting director general at the ministry.
"With the forecast of outputs of 69.871 million ton un-hulled rice and the number of population 252.165 million people, based on calculation (we) are still surplus of 4.2 million ton," he said at his office.
The Indonesian government would not import rice this year as the domestic production is sufficient to meet demand, said the country's deputy agriculture minister Rusman Heriawan has said.
Heriawan revealed that the country's hulled-rice production was estimated to grow by 0.35 percent to 34 million tons this year from a year earlier based on the first government forecast, and he expected the figure to rise in the second estimate that would be announced soon.
Indonesia had previously imported rice, the staple food for most of its large populations, from Thailand, Vietnam and other countries.
The deputy minister said that self-sufficiency on rice would continue to the coming years.
The Indonesian government expected to raise rice stockpile to 2. 7 million tons this year, in an attempt to strengthen food security, Hatta Rajasa, former economic chief minister has disclosed.
