The Central Statistics Agency (BPS) recorded that in 2019, the rice harvested area was estimated at 10.68 million hectares with a production of 54.60 million tons of MPD. If converted to rice, rice production in 2019 will reach around 31.31 million tons. Compared to 2018, this rice production has decreased by 2.63 million tons (7.75%).
The head of BPS, Suhariyanto, said that the harvesting area calculation uses the Area Sample Framework (KSA) method, which began in 2017 by utilizing satellite imagery technology and maps of paddy fields. In the KSA method, data on rice production is obtained from the multiplication of harvested area and productivity or production per hectare.
The KSA method is the result of collaboration and collaboration between BPS, the Ministry of Agriculture and Spatial Planning / National Land Agency (Ministry of ATR / BPN), the Ministry of Agriculture, the Agency for Assessment and Application of Technology (BPPT), the Geospatial Information Agency (BIG), and the Aviation and Space Agency National (Lapan).
Suhariyanto further said that rice is a staple food for the Indonesian population and has a very important meaning for the Indonesian economy. The instability of rice prices will have a major impact on inflation and poverty, so that the stabilization of rice prices must be maintained. To be able to produce this, the accuracy of rice data must receive major attention.
To estimate the harvested area using the KSA Method, explained Suhariyanto, the first step was to determine the map of the paddy field. The 2019 paddy field area released by the Ministry of ATR / BPN is 7.46 million hectares. The largest area of paddy field is in East Java, Central Java, West Java, South Sulawesi and South Sumatra.
This map of the paddy land area is then combined with a map of the earth's appearance and an administrative map added with a map of land cover. "The results of the overlays from these 4 maps are what we put together and then we take samples in the form of rice fields in the form of segments measuring 300 x 300 square meters. We will lock up the number of segments and the officer must come there using his cellphone to take pictures of the field, "he explained.
Officers can only take pictures when they are within a radius of 10 square meters. Every month, officers in the field must visit around 218,000 observation points. Photographs are sent to the server to determine the land in the land preparation phase, initial vegetative, final vegetative, harvest period or land use change.
KSA 2018 results obtained a total harvest area of 11.38 million hectares with a peak harvest in March 2018. While in 2019 there was a decrease in the total harvest area of 6.15% due to extreme weather which resulted in flooding at the beginning of the year and a long dry season.
The decrease in total harvested area affected rice production, which decreased from 59.2 million tons of milled unhusked rice to 54.60 million tons of paddy. The decline in rice production occurred in almost all provinces, especially for the production center provinces such as Central Java, East Java, West Java and South Sulawesi.
"The movement of rice production fluctuations is what makes the grain price movements. When rice production is high, the price of grain will drop. Conversely, when rice production is low, the price of grain will increase. Therefore, the government has always paid attention to the situation since November, January and February, "explained Suhariyanto.
From the latest price movement, BPS released the price of harvested dried rice increased by 1.13%, but the price of highly controlled rice only rose 0.85%. According to Suhariyanto, this caused the share of rice in inflation in 2019 to be very, very small.
To estimate rice production, BPS uses a 64.02% conversion of milled dry grain production. From the conversion results, total rice production in 2018 was 33.94 million tons and in 2019 it was 31.31 million tons. While Indonesia's rice needs for a year are around 29.6 million tons.
If comparing rice production with rice consumption needs, in 2018 there will be a surplus of 4.37 million tons of rice, and in 2019 there will still be a surplus of 1.53 million tons of rice. "That is why rice prices in 2019 are still moving steadily, especially since the rice reserves we have now are also quite large," he said.
According to Suhariyanto, the movement of rice production and surplus between time and between provinces must be kept in mind because there are provinces that have a surplus, there are provinces that have a deficit. "Therefore, a policy that is concentrated on the availability of supply, smooth distribution, affordability and effective communication between the center and the regions becomes a key that must be considered from time to time," he concluded.
