News Focus: People lamenting soaring soybean price

People in Indonesia today can hardly find fermented soybean cake, locally known as tempe, in the markets as the price of soybean, the main ingredient in the traditional food, has increased to an unprecedented level.
Tempe is a food popular mainly among the common or low-income people who usually have it as a side-dish in rice-based meals.
The soybean price has risen to a level where tempe producers who mostly belong to the small or micro enterprises group can no longer afford to buy it. As a result, tempe has disappeared from the markets.
Many tempe producers have protested the increase in the soybean price because it has disrupted their business to the extent of compelling them to lay off workers or even to go bankrupt.
Besides tempe producers, other businesses offering soybean-based products like soybean milk are also suffering by the soybean scarcity in the market.
Due to the scarcity of soybean in the market, a number of tempe producers in Sidoarjo, East Java, resorted to increasing the price of their product by up to 50 percent.
The chairman of the Candi Tofu-Tempe Cooperative in Sidoarjo, Sukari, said because of the soaring price of imported soybean, tempe producers were forced to raise their tempe price or to reduce the size of their soybean cakes.
As raw material for tempe and tofu, Sukari said, tempe producers in Sidoarjo used soybean imported from Argentina and the United States which is now scarce in the market.
Small-scale companies producing tofu, tempe and soybean milk in Bengkulu are even on the verge of bankruptcy due to the 100-percent hike in the soybean price from Rp3,500/kg to Rp8,000/Kg.
A tempe-tofu producer in ..