They demanded the central government and local administrations tackle the issue in order to stabilize the price of the commodities.

“If the products enter freely and sell at unrealistically low prices in Indonesia, they are killing us slowly,” Marta, who runs an anchovy and salted fish business in Pasaran Island, Lampung, said Monday.

Marta said Thai salted fish entered Indonesia through a small port in Jambi and from there were shipped to Lampung and Jakarta from the eastern coast of Sumatra.

“We are surprised that the products can enter quite freely and can be sold for 50 percent cheaper than our products,” Marta said.

The price of a kilogram of local salted teri nasi in Lampung and Jakarta, for example, is Rp 50,000 (US$5) compared to that from Thai, which sells for between Rp 23,000 and Rp 25,000. Local salted teri jengki costs Rp 30,000 per kilogram, compared to Rp 15,000 for the Thai version.

Herza Yulianto, director of Mitra Betala, an NGO providing supervision to fishermen and coastal communities, urged the government to act quickly to deal with the impact of the influx of Thai fish products in Indonesian markets to prevent local fishermen from going bankrupt.

He said tens of thousands of traditional fishermen, vendors and others along the eastern and western coasts of Sumatra depended on the local fishing industry.

“Unless protection is given by the government, the livelihoods of all these people are threatened,” Herza said.

One measure of protection, Herza suggested, was to prevent foreign fishing fleets from directly selling their catch to buyers in Jakarta.

“It doesn’t make sense that given the same operating costs, Thai fishermen can sell their products for much less than local fishermen,” he added.

Pasaran, a 12-hectare island located off Bandarlampung, the capital of Lampung province, has long been known as Indonesia’s biggest anchovy production center, producing 5 tons of anchovies daily.

Until recently, there were 80 anchovy processors on the island. But due to stiff competition from Thai products, that number has now decreased to 43.

The producers are grouped into five clusters, each carrying halal certificates from the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI) and hygiene certificates from the Lampung Health Agency.

Bandarlampung Mayor Eddy Sutrisno said his administration was looking into building communal storage facilities for local fishermen to store products they did not need to offload immediately.

He added that Pasaran fishermen were an integral part of the municipal economy, generating an average revenue of Rp 300 million per month per fish processor.

“The salted anchovy they produce are of good quality as they are made from freshly caught fish directly processed on the fishing boats,” Eddy said.

Big fish eating small fish?: Villagers sort out small fish on Pasaran Island, Lampung. It is feared local small fish businesses could go bankrupt because of uncontrolled entry of fish from Thailand at lower prices. JP/Oyos Suroso

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