Indonesia’s second largest shrimp exporter, Bumi Menara Internusa (BMI), is looking to sell more value-added products and diversify into other species, as it seeks to cope with a high shrimp raw material cost. Aris Utama, BMI director, said that the company is operating its own farm, but this covers around ten percent of its raw material needs. The rest comes from contract farms.
He added that the supply of raw material is tight and prices from farmers are high. He also said that passing on price increases to the market is not easy. The market has been awkward for the last year or two relative to the supply for packers. BMI produces value-added products such as breaded shrimp to skewers and other ready-to-eat items.
The company is looking to continue to grow sales to the home market, where the 240 million plus Indonesians are getting wealthier and spending more on food. Utama said that the foodservice sector is the target in Indonesia and not only for seafood. He told that BMI is looking to supply other food products to foodservice operators in the home market in an effort to become more of a general food company, rather than purely seafood.
