Indonesia ramping up grain production

Trying times: A woman shops for food at a market in Jakarta. The war in Ukraine has made problems like inflation much worse for Indonesia with soaring food and energy prices. — AP

JAKARTA: Indonesia, a resource-rich country but also one of the world’s top importers of wheat and sugar, is boosting production of staple crops as the Covid-19 pandemic and war in Ukraine expose risks in its food supply chain.Already the biggest palm oil producer, the South-East Asian nation is trying to increase output of corn and wheat substitutes like sorghum, sago and cassava.

The move is fuelled by worldwide labour shortages, soaring energy costs and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which propelled global food prices to records.