Australian cattle station manager Michael Sheehy advises the Indonesian government to place its cattle industry in the hands of corporate agribusiness if it wants to see growth in the sector and self-sufficiency for the country in beef. Livestock in Indonesia is mostly comprised of low-tech, small operations protected by government tariffs and quotas from international competition. These measures have driven up the price of beef to a high point of US$8.80 per kilogram. Mr. Sheehy advises local Indonesian businessmen to partner with Australian and Singaporean partners to create large-scale corporate-run ranches of approximately 50,000 hectares – just as the palm oil overcame high start-up costs by creating large-scale plantations run by agribusiness giants such as Astra Agricultural and Wilmer International. Combining a switch to a corporate model of doing business and switching to using leucaena as livestock fodder which is more suited to Indonesia’s climate and which can grow on marginal land would go far toward building Indonesia’s self-sufficiency in beef.
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