Economics
In Indonesia, Getting Accurate Data Is Like ‘Finding a Pokemon’
- Rice imports have surged based on inaccurate food surveys
- Statistics agents must verify satellite data of rice crops
A farmer spreads rice out to dry in a village inside the Jatigede dam in Sumedang Regency, West Java province, Indonesia.
Photographer: Dimas Ardian/Bloomberg
This article is for subscribers only.
Indonesia’s government is set to export rice for the first time in more than a decade -- not because the country has turned in a bumper harvest but because it’s been importing the grain based on faulty data collection, resulting in an oversupply of stocks.
The statistics agency has now overhauled its rice output survey to improve the data. It’s also making its surveyors climb mountains and trek down valleys, sometimes in remote islands, to verify satellite images of more than 200,000 paddy fields.