Discussion with Mr. Teten Masduki, Minister of Cooperatives and SMEs
On January 22, 2020, the @SCOPI_ID team had a discussion with the Minister of Cooperatives and Small-Medium Enterprises (SMEs), Mr. Teten Masduki at his office to present the pathways to sustainable coffee in Indonesia. Around 96% of coffee farms in Indonesia are owned by smallholders with low productivity of approximately 700 kg/ha. Such low productivity is influenced by various factors, which include access to information/knowledge to implement Good Agricultural Practices (GAP), Post-Harvesting, Access to Market and Access to Finance. The largest challenge of the Indonesian coffee sector relies on the upstream side of the supply chain, where almost 50% of Indonesian coffee plants are older than 50 years with low productivity. Therefore, replanting activity is essential to improve coffee productivity.
Through collaborating with the Ministry of Cooperatives and SMEs, SCOPI aims to strengthen farmers organization in the form of cooperatives which can enable farmers to gain more access to finance. Apart from that, farmers cooperatives can also escalate farmers’ bargaining positions to the off-takers.