IPB's corn noodles win int'l contest

Novia D. Rulistia , The Jakarta Post , Jakarta | Sun, 07/19/2009 11:27 AM | Discover

Students of the Bogor Institute of Agriculture (IPB) started producing instant corn noodle to alleviate malnutrition-related health problems and the product won the international food technology contest.

Galih Nugroho, Ari Try Purbayanto, Riza Aris Apriady, Kamalita Pertiwi and Catherine Haryasyah produced instant corn noodle which has been fortified with various microorganism.

They presented their 6-page paper on the innovation at the IFP Annual Meeting and Food Expo organized by the Institute of Technologists in the United States. Their innovation ranked third in the competition, after the Netherlands and South Africa.

"We're so excited. It's a tough competition but we know we were ready to compete and we knew we could compete as we've prepared at our utmost," Galih said.

"We have done some research about many health problems in Southeast Asia countries and we found that there are still many cases about food nutrition deficiency. So we decided to take this as our case," said the eight semester student at IPB's food technology study.

To make it more specific, he said, the group focused on food nutrition deficiency in pregnant women as most cases were found in them.

"They are the medium to carry the micro nutrition for their future babies," he said.

Through the product, Galih said, the mothers-to-be could consume a lot of nutrition up to three times a week which were important during pregnancy.

Corn noodle was first brought on to research table in 1998 with several researchers from IPB involved in the project.

To make the noodle, the team use corn flour and mixed it with protein-fortified egg flour and add to it several nutrition. Next, the dough is undergoing an extrusion process, a process to create a certain texture by pressing all materials.

The production takes around one-and-a-half to two hours.

"The process is not that hard, the ingredients are affordable so that the price of the noodle is also affordable," said Galih, adding that its economical side was one of the reasons they won the contest.

The other considerations were because they make the full use of local resources, the technology can be easily used by people, and of their free-preservative but full of protein product.

Although the five have got international acknowledgement for the innovation, further research is still needed to optimize the instant corn noodle before it hits the market.

"We hope with this, the death of pregnant women suffering from malnutrition can be decreasing."

Minister of Agriculture Anton Apriyantono said during a recent ceremony to honor the achievement that the government was encouraging industry players to adopt the new technology so that the product could be soon available in the community.

Only 166 Scientific Journals Have Received National Accreditation

Excerpt:
Out of hundreds of scientific journals published in Indonesia, only 116 have received national accreditation. Many journals cannot get accredited because they cannot publish regularly, do not have full-time editors, and because of their poor reviewing capability.

This year, the goverment is encouraging 50 national scientific journals to upgrade their quality to become international journals by providing each of them with financial assistance of IDR 150 million. In addition to this, 200 other journals will also receive IDR 50 million each to improve their quality to meet the national-standard journals.

Financial support will also be given to 50 out of 300 professional organizations to participate in international scientific forums. Each of them will receive IDR 500 million.

Indonesia's research productivity level is still very low, according to Fasli Jalal, the Director General for Higher Education of the Department of National Education. Scientists only contribute about 0.8 percent of article per 1 million population in the scientific journals.

IEI - Wednesday, 15 April 2009

Penelitian
Baru 116 Jurnal Ilmiah Berakreditasi Nasional
Rabu, 15 April 2009 04:42 WIB

Jakarta, Kompas - Dari ratusan jurnal ilmiah yang ada di Tanah Air, baru 116 jurnal ilmiah yang berakreditasi nasional. Rendahnya mutu jurnal ilmiah yang lain karena penerbitannya tidak teratur, editor yang tidak penuh waktu, dan kemampuan review yang rendah.

Direktur Jenderal Pendidikan Tinggi Departemen Pendidikan Nasional Fasli Jalal di Jakarta, Selasa (14/4), mengatakan, tahun ini pemerintah mendorong 50 jurnal ilmiah nasional dengan dukungan dana masing-masing Rp 150 juta untuk bisa meningkatkan kualitasnya sehingga mampu masuk menjadi jurnal ilmiah internasional. Selain itu, dukungan peningkatan mutu untuk menjadi jurnal ilmiah berskala nasional juga diberikan kepada 200 jurnal ilmiah dengan dana masing-masing Rp 50 juta.

Menurut Fasli, ada 50 dari 300 organisasi profesi yang didukung pemerintah untuk bisa mengadakan atau menghadiri forum ilmiah internasional dengan dana masing-masing Rp 500 juta.

Menurut Fasli, produktivitas penelitian di Indonesia masih rendah. Kemampuan ilmuwan untuk menyumbang penelitian ke jurnal ilmiah hanya 0,8 artikel per 1 juta penduduk. Padahal, di Indonesia saat ini ada 7.900 peneliti dari LIPI, BPPT, dan lembaga penelitian di departemen, sedangkan di perguruan tinggi ada sekitar 155.000 dosen.

Penghargaan intelektual
Pada tahun ini, pemerintah menggelar penghargaan kepada dosen, peneliti, dan masyarakat yang menghasilkan kekayaan intelektual luar biasa.

Sadjuga dari Kantor Menteri Negara Riset dan Teknologi mengatakan, penghargaan tersebut untuk memotivasi para penghasil kekayaan intelektual agar terus eksis dengan keahliannya.

Adapun kategori penghargaan dibagi atas kekayaan industri yang meliputi 14 subbidang serta hak cipta yang terdiri atas 26 bidang ilmu pengetahuan dan 10 bidang industri kreatif. Penghargaan diberikan untuk 50 pemenang dengan hadiah masing-masing Rp 250 juta.

Hindarwati, Kepala Perlindungan Varietas Tanaman Departemen Pertanian, mengatakan, penelitian di bidang pertanian sebenarnya cukup banyak, tetapi belum dimanfaatkan optimal. (ELN)