Fish drying in East Java, Indonesia

• Research Institute for Fishery Technology, Indonesia
• La Trobe University, Australia

Indonesia harvests a huge fish catch, but loses much of the benefit through post-harvest-harvest losses, currently estimated at 30% or more. In East Java, villagers process more than 70% of the catch as dried salted fish, which also undergoes considerable wastage. While the need to reduce the post-harvest losses of these high-protein but unstable foods is urgent, it is vital to implement improved practices in a manner appropriate to the economy of the region and through products that find local acceptance.
This project will characterise and evaluate the current practices, their variations and defects, and involve experimental studies designed to overcome such defects from the time of fish capture to the time of retail sale of dried fishery products from Muncar, East Java. All stages will include an economic evaluation and establishment of cost-benefit analyses for procedures developed to establish solutions. It has a number of related aims: to upgrade the drier-design skills of Indonesian workers; to establish the fundamental knowledge necessary for an appropriate design of fish dries; to define the extent and cause of dried fish wastage and/or economic loss in the system to define and implement solutions in order to establish in Muncar, model procedures of positive cost-benefit and to encourage their wider adoption throughout East Java; to identify priority areas requiring further basic research; and to recommend such areas for later co-operative study.
In Indonesia, scientists from the Research Institute for Fish Technology (RIFT) will investigate on-board handling and fish landing and classification. Others at the University of Brawijaya (UNIBRAW), in association with staff of Canada's International Development Research Centre, will contribute information on salting and bringing and study drying at Muncar. The two groups will combine to evaluate dried products. In each of these areas, the team will define current practices and develop and assess possible variations in usage, with emphasis on development of a five-category sensory grading scale.
Meanwhile, the Australian scientists will undertake fundamental drying studies in Sydney, to establish fish drying curves in terms of air temperature, humidity and velocity, product: air orientation, fatty and non-fatty fish, pretreatment method, fishery form and thickness. They will assess physical, chemical and microbiological aspects of dried products, during and after drying and during storage. Using established fundamentals, they will try to solve problems identified in Muncar and to establish drier designs appropriate to the economics, resources and needs of smaller and less developed fishery centres of East Java.
Scientists from both countries will study the packaging, storage, transport, distribution, marketing and retailing arrangements that apply to the Muncar catch. Again they will define current practices and problem areas, but will emphasise other economic aspects in addition to losses from wastage.
Indonesia's Ministry of Agriculture can provide considerable statistical records, giving basic information on fish catches of East Java and of Mucar in particular, and ambient weather conditions in various areas. This will help in establishing priority ranking in the extension of model Muncar processes to other regions of East Java.
Features of this project include additional training in Australia for Indonesian participants and the scientific contacts and collaboration in Indonesia with the IDRC of Canada. Moreover, the examination of the socio-economic factors involved in dry fish preservation and marketing will provide a valuable base line to evaluate further areas of research. The project complements ACIAR Project 8304 on fish spoilage in Indonesia; together they will make a substantial contribution to preventing post-harvest loss of fish.