FAKTOR-FAKTOR YANG MEMENGARUHI PERMINTAAN DAN EFEKTIVITAS KEBIJAKAN IMPOR GARAM INDONESIA

Salt is a strategic commodity which its demand will continue to increase along with the increasing population. The imbalance between the demand and the supply of salt in Indonesia encourages the government to import salt. This study aimed to analyze: the factors that influence the demand of salt import, the effectiveness of salt import and alternative formulation of domestic salt policies. The panel regression model was conducted to address the problem. The study found that the variables that significantly influenced the import demand of salt in Indonesia were domestic salt production, imported salt price, real GDP of Indonesia, real GDP of importing source country and real exchange rate. Domestic salt production and imported salt price had a negative relationship towards import volume, while other variables had a positive relationship. Another finding is that the goverment policy of importing salt has not been fully implemented at the time of this study. The policies that should be further improved by the goverment can be done by synchronizing the data, strenghtening the monitoring import policy, land intensification and extension support in order to produce salt.