(VIVAnews) Ministry of Fisheries and Maritime Affairs stated that Indonesia is considered the largest tuna exporter in ASEAN.
“The export volume reaches 141,774 tons. If liquidated, [the value] will reach US$449 million per year,” said Director General of Fisheries Processing and Marketing of the Ministry of Fisheries and Maritime Affairs, Saut P Hutagalung, in Yogyakarta, on Thursday.
Saut said Indonesia and other ASEAN nations are the world’s largest tuna suppliers with the production of 26.2 percent of the world’s tuna production of 1.7 million tons.
“Various attempts have been made to improve the competitiveness of Indonesia’s tuna in the world by creating partnership in tuna fisheries and opening tuna market worldwide among any others,” he said.
Mugari, a fisherman from Sadeng Beach, Bantul, Yogyakarta, said the southern sea of Java sees larger potential of potential tuna compared to the northern sea of the island.
“Every time we fish on a 15-tons boat, we can produce around 3-5 tons of tuna with varying weight. As for 30-tons boat and above, we can produce dozens of tuna,” he said.
Meanwhile, the most popular tuna is the ones weighing more than 25 kilograms, whereas baby tuna is for local consumption.
“The international community bans the fishing of baby tuna, so it’s sold to the local market,” said Mugari. He said that the tuna season in the southern sea of Java starts from June to September, thus the catch is relatively abundant.
Baby tuna is tagged at Rp12,000 per kilogram, while the exported tuna can be valued Rp50,000 per kilogram.