Gold Mine of Knowledge at Soy Symposium in Surabaya Indonesia

Leaving the U.S.

Hello readers. This is my first blog writing experience with NSRL and also just happens to to be my first blog writing experience ever.

I am now on my way to Tokyo and we are ascending out of Detroit. So, given that everything works out as planned, I am en route to meet up with our executive director, Dr. Hans Stein, in Hong Kong. We will touch base, slap a high five, and take our separate flights to the great land of Surabaya, Indonesia of the 3rd Soy Symposium. Surabaya, Indonesia is the capitals city of East Java Island (Jakarta being the capital city of West Java Island). In fact, last year around this time, Dr. Karl Weingartner and I paid a visit to Jakarta where we learned so much about soy 's role there. Indonesia is country of several beautiful islands. I cannot wait to return and explore some more.

Indonesia

Indonesians have been consuming soy as far back as records are able to go on human life in that region. Asia, after all, is the birthplace of soy. What I have found is that in Indonesia, the most popular use of soy for human consumption is used in making tempe. Tempe is a value added product that surfaced in the 16th Century which utilizes the whole soybean. The whole soybean is allowed to ferment in a special environment of dry heat. The majority of tempe production occurs in the informal sector. Just like in many different segments of the informal sector, scores of entrepreneurs independently operate their own small scale tempe and tofu factories (shown the picture). This is a vertical business because the same group of people that produce the product will also sell their own product in the market or on the street sides. Unbelievably,m when visiting small scale tempe producer in West Java in 2009, I peeked into the storage room of a tempe/tofu producer and found the small 5ft. x 5ft hut supplied with U.S. soy.

Turns out, in 2007, Indonesian imported 1.1 million metric tons of soy and only produced 0.6 million metric tons. Ten years before that one could virtually reverse those numbers. In ten years, what makes a country turn from a soy producing country to a soy importing country?

In 1999, Indonesia held its first free parliamentary election. Indonesia is now the world's third largest democracy. The country also has the immediate advantage of manufacturing various goods at low cost due to the availability of low cost labor. Another factor is that more and more Indonesians are moving to the metropolitan areas.

The macro-economist in me now rests.

The Symposium

Monday's session was very interesting. It was a detailed introduction and look into the food industry in Indonesia. Information was delivered in many graphs showing aggregate data on what the Indonesian consumes, total soy consumption, and in what forms the soy is consumed.

I've been carrying around the canister that contains our NSRL international poster. I had the chance to display it during a poster session at the symposium and it generated much conversation about who we are what we do and our impact with soy around the world. I've used the poster to break the ice and have some quality conversations about how NSRL. NSRL's attractive gold color that represents our International Outreach Activities also stands for the 'gold quality' of knowledge that NSRL is willing to share with our partners and beneficiaries across the globe, knowledge of the benefits of using soy to combat hunger and improve nutrition.
Dr. Hans H. Stein gave a presentation at the conference on the amino acid profile of soy and how soy plays an essential role in delivering much needed protein to those who need it.

"Children have a much greater requirement for amino acids than adults if calculated as a percentage of the diet and if they consume diets that are mainly based on cereal grains and pulses, they usually do not receive sufficient quantities of amino acids." - Dr. Stein (from symposium presentation abstract). The participants really enjoyed his presentation. They soaked up what he had to say so well because they were hearing things from a new perspective. NSRL has definitely benefited the people attending this conference through the knowledge that has been shared here today. Moreover, NSRL has learned so much from this conference. It was amazing to hear what Indonesians had to say about soy in their part of the world. By listening to them, we have embarked into a new realm of understanding where Indonesia's priorities lie in the soy industry.

Add the industry knowledge of Dr. Mark Messina and Peter Golbitz to this equation and this symposium is a gold mine of opportunity for for knowledge transfer among the attendees.

Warmest Regards from Indonesia,

Nick Scates