Kupang (Antara NTT) - The population of beef cows in East Nusa Tenggara (NTT) is enough to meet the beef consumption in the country, an observer said here on Tuesday.
Dean of Animal Husbandry Faculty of Kupang`s Nusa Cendana University Damianus Adar said in the past year the province had supplied beef cows to meet meat requirement in Jakarta and Kalimantan.
Based on the last census three largest districts in cow population in NTT are the regencies of Timor Tengah Selatan with a population of 167,800 beef cows, Kupang with a population of 151,200 cows and Belu 111,200 cows. Other district has less than 100,000 beef cows each.
Milch cows are found only in three regencies -- Timor Tengah Selatan having 23 cows, Belu 5 cows and Kupang 4 cows.
Buffaloes are raised mainly in the regencies of Sumba Timur with a population of 37,100; Manggarai Barat with a population of 22,600; and Sumba Barat Daya 13,700 cows.
Among the islands of the province, Timor has the largest population of 533,700 beef cows making up 68.5 percent of the total population of beef cows in NTT, followed by the island of Flores with a population of 132,400, Sumba 62,500, and other islands Alor, Lembata, Rote Ndao, and Sabu Raijua together 50,100 .
Damianus said the province was ready to supply 589,600 beef cows to other regions such as Jakarta.
He said the government should prohibit the sales of productive female cows and cows below 300 kg in weight to other regions, otherwise the province would be left without the livestock.
NTT should be developed as a cow breeding center complete with feed lots and beef processing factories, he said.
Earlier this month, the neighboring province West Nusa Tenggara (NTB) said it hopes to supply 35,000 live beef cows to other provinces this year.
"This year the target is the same as last year, though last year realization was not up to 50 percent or only 15,000 cows," head of the Animal Husbandry and Healthy office of the region H Aminurrahman said in the provincial city of Mataram.
Among the provinces receiving beef cow supplies from West Nusa Tenggara are Central Sulawesi, South Sulawesi, Southeast Sulawesi, West Sulawesi, West Java, and East Java.
Demand for beef cows came from companies outside the province having partnership networks with counterparts in West Nusa Tenggara, Aminurrahman said.
"NTB could supply beef cows as many as other provinces need. We have the potency to sustain supplies of up to 130,000 beef cows a year," he said.
NTB also hopes to sell up to 10,000 breeder cows in 2017, he said, adding cow breeders have been shipped to other regions every year mainly to Kalimantan, South Sumatran, Riau Islands, and Bangka Belitung.
Demands have come not only from companies but also from individual farmers especially those having oil palm plantations, he said.
Many oil palm farmers raise cows to feed on the grass in their plantations.
Demand for breeder cows from other provinces is high but NTB could not supply more than 10,000 a year to sustain its cow population.
"Bali breeder cows from NTB are high in demand, probably as they are known to be highly resistant to disease," Aminurrahman said.
Therefore, the NTB Animal Husbandry and Health office, has encourage farmers to raise mammals both cows and buffaloes such as through artificial insemination. Frozen semen of male cows is available at the Regional Artificial Insemination Center in Banyumulek, regency of Lombok Barat.
Farmers are told not to slaughter productive female cows. A regional regulation has been issued to prevent the slaughtering of productive female cows.
Poor infrastructure and high logistic cost is the main problem in the supply of live cows from various producing areas in the country.
Indonesia, therefore, still relies on import for beef or live beef cows to meet its domestic requirement. Imports have been made mainly from Australia, India and Latin America.
This world`s largest Muslim country needs large imports especially ahead of Ied ul Fitr.
Meanwhile, the price of live cows in Situbondo, East Java, has shot up ahead of Idul Adha 2017 to Rp60,000 per kilogram from normally Rp45,000 - Rp50,000 per kilogram.
"The price began to scale up last month," head of the Situbondo district office of the Animal Husbandry Service, Aries Marhaento said on Tuesday.
