Our field team just came back from our annual Fair for Life & organic audits at our Clove and Vanilla plantations. TRIPPER continues to improve its partnership with farmers and this is reflected in an increase of our scores from Fair for Life. The next step is to support the beneficiaries in getting organized as a farmer group so that they have more power in setting fair prices.

Although the Vanilla farmers planted new vines, they lack confidence about their 2017 crop due to the poor quality of Vanilla seedlings they managed to get a hold of during the shortage. Only time can reveal how the new crop will fare.

In other news, we continue to shorten our supply chain in Indonesia and seek to move Ginger & Vanilla networks as close to processing facilities as possible.

In Asia it is commonly said that when China sneezes neighboring countries catch the flu. This perfectly describes Indonesia’s current economic situation. Indonesia is heavily dependent on its Chinese counterpart for export of commodities such as coal, palm oil, nickel. Naturally, when China’s growth slowed, so did Indonesia’s.

Various economic statistics show that a slowdown is happening in Southeast Asia’s largest economy. Indonesia’s central bank slashed GDP projection to 4.9% from 5.3%. Domestic consumption is responsible for 60% of economic activity and with the average Indonesian worried about the future, we are witnessing a drop in sales of consumer goods.

The government is doing its utmost to rebuild confidence for the Indonesian middle class and boost foreign investment. The recent appointment of a finance minister known for her fiscal discipline has increased confidence in the government’s ability to tackle its short and long-term economic challenges. The government hopes a new tax amnesty will generate inflows from wealthy Indonesians who have long held their money in offshore havens. An end to oil exploration taxes is meant to help revive the Indonesian oil industry, which suffered heavily from a max exodus of foreign operators. It takes time to see the effects of new regulation, so there is unlikely to be drastic immediate change to the current economic climate. The result of policies implemented in 2015 aren’t expected to show until the end of 2017.

President Jokowi still has high hopes of executing his goal of 7% growth by the end of his term. He has the support of both the people and the majority of the Indonesian parliament. After meetings for an Indonesian/United States economic initiative, the US Chamber of Commerce Executive VP also believes his goal is still attainable.

Our natural spray-dried extract powder captures all the flavor of perfectly ripe bananas. We use Pisang Raja, a local Indonesian variety of banana that has a stronger flavor than the Cavendish variety most commonly used in typical banana powders. You won’t find any imitation flavors or synthetic additives here. We only use water, bananas, and organic rice maltodextrin. Spray-dried banana powder is excellent for use in deserts, baked goods, blended drinks and makes an excellent natural sweetener. Banana extract powder is particularly attractive because of its lower microbial count, resulting in a longer shelf life.