Ahmad Sobirin (34), the driving actor who succeeded in changing the face of the coconut sugar industry in Banyumas.

With the sociopreneur concept, he has transformed coconut sugar products from previously underestimated to be excellent in the digital market to penetrate foreign markets.

When talking with Kompas.com, Saturday (10/16/2021), the man who is familiarly called Sobirin recounted how he started to enter the palm sugar business in 2013. started little by little inviting to switch from printed sugar production to palm sugar,” he said.

The main reason Sobirin focuses on granulated sugar is because he sees the growth of the ‘sweet chocolate’ market getting stronger. He also believes that Semedo Village’s sugar products have more bargaining value because they are processed with organic treatment. “But at first it was very difficult to provide education about this new product to the farmers, because most of them didn’t want to be complicated,” said the alumni of the Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Gajah Mada (UGM).

Sobirin explained, ant sugar or crystal sugar is coconut sugar in powder form. According to him, the farmers are reluctant to switch because the production process for ant sugar is a little more complicated than printed sugar.

“The initial process is actually the same, coconut sap is cooked until it becomes thick (caramelized). The difference is, if the sugar is just poured into the mold, while the palm sugar is still a further process, such as grinding, sifting and drying or in the oven,” he said. As time goes by, more and more penderes are finally willing to learn and switch to brown sugar.

This is because the price difference between printed sugar and palm sugar is far adrift. Imagine, the printed sugar that was produced 10 years ago was only priced at Rp. 1,500 per kilogram, while ant sugar or crystal sugar has touched the price of Rp. 7,000 per kilogram.

“In addition, the foreign market for palm sugar products is also growing, especially in Europe. Demand is always increasing because of awareness of healthy lifestyles, they shift their consumption of cane sugar to organic coconut sugar,” he said. To accommodate the penderes and uniform product quality, Sobirin formed the Manggar Jaya Farmers Group in 2014.

This forum continues to grow until it is transformed into a Joint Business Group (Kube). When the palm sugar market became more and more excited, Sobirin took the initiative to improve his sugar palm branding with the “Semedo Manise” brand. Improved quality, improved packaging and expanded market to become a major supplier to one of the largest exporters in Banyumas Raya.

Souerce : Kompas.com