The first shipment of frozen chicken weighed 50 tonnes were exported from Indonesia to Singapore on Wednesday, July 13, under a new arrangement for Indonesian companies to export chicken to Singapore.
Charoen Pokphand Indonesia (CPI) has secured a contract with a Singaporean importer to supply 1,000 tonnes of chicken meat until the end of the year.
To recap, CPI is a subsidiary of Thailand-based food conglomerate Charoen Pokphand.
“We hope that this first shipment to Singapore will boost the national poultry industry and open the way for Indonesian poultry products to penetrate the global market further,” said CPI’s president commissoner Hadi Gunawan Tjoe.
“Hopefully (Indonesia’s) poultry export to Singapore will be sustainable and continue to grow for years to come.”
Indonesian Agriculture Minister Syahrul Yasin Limpo, expressed his hope during the ceremony by saying, “Singapore has a high standard for their food imports. I hope that this shipment will boost confidence of other countries towards Indonesian food products.”
The Indonesian minister also told reporters that President Joko Widodo has prioritised Indonesia’s domestic needs and national food security, and “we are experiencing an oversupply of chicken which enables us to export our chicken products overseas.”
“This will inspire producers to boost their production so that we can continue to enjoy such surplus, fulfil the global demand for poultry products, while still maintaining our food security and stability of prices domestically,” the Indonesian minister added.
According to the Singapore Food Agency (SFA), three companies from Indonesia had been given permission to export chicken meat and chicken meat products into the country.
According to the Indonesian Agriculture Ministry, there are 12 other Indonesian companies which are seeking permission to export chicken products to Singapore and have submitted their appllications to SFA.
The SFA has stated that individual establishments and farms needed to be evaluated and approved, with detailed documentary evaluations and on-site audits for verification, before they are given permission to export food to Singapore.
In 2021, a total of 214,400 tonnes of chicken meat imported by Singapore, a third were from Malaysia.
Following the Malaysian export ban, Singapore announced that it will source chickens from other places, including Indonesia and Thailand and announced on Jun 30 that it has added Indonesia as a new source for the import of chilled, frozen and processed chicken.
