Jakarta (ANTARA News) - President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono held a meeting with a number of national food businessmen to discuss the problems of food prices and basic needs at the State Palace on Wednesday evening.
About 30 food business association chairmen sat together with a number of cabinet ministers and Presidential Advisory Council members at the meeting also attended by Vice President Jusuf Kalla.
In his remarks opening the meeting, the President said the discussion was expected to yield clarifications on the upward trend in food prices and declines in food stocks that had happened lately.
The chairman of the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin), MS Hidayat, said before the meeting he would propose to the government to use the State Logistics Agency (Bulog) as a buffer for farmers` rice prices in order to encourage farmers to cultivate three principal crops, namely rice, maize and soybean.
Kadin, he said, would also propose that farmers who planted the three crops be provided with fertilizers free of charge, subsidized seedlings and easy access to bank credit facilities.
"The government should also allow investors to invest in the cultivation of basic food crops in selected agricultural areas with the obligation to achieve certain production targets," Hidayat said.
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