MCJ : Thank you Pak Vincent for your time. Can you tell us a more about yourself, what you do when you first arrived and how has your career taken off to where you are today?
Vincent : I am working for a Malaysian Company as the CFO and has been in Indonesia for 5 years. I grew up in Penang and I have enjoyed the outdoors and sports since young. Moving to Jakarta has slowed me down on sports. I used to do marathons, triathlons and did one iron man race. Today all this has to take a back seat as there are no proper place for training. I hope I can still do this when I retire. Probably a lot of people will be saying that by the time we are at 50 plus it would be difficult. Well, to compete competitively it would be difficult to finish the race but I believe it’s still possible. I know a man who still do this race and he is today 60 and another grandmother who did the race.
Coming to Jakarta has been one of the best decision that I made for my career. Not only moving up in my career but the exposure was way a lot more. Especially when I came here, Indonesia was affected by economy crisis and after the crisis, Indonesia economy pick up into a fast pace. I had to face the tough time then and today i face challenges keeping pace with the the demands of expansion plans and meeting with investors who are keen to invest in Indonesia and Malindo.
MCJ : Congratulations to you. Now, tell us more about the industry you are in, how big it is and what are the main obstacles you faced and do you see any solutions in sight?
Vincent : The industry I am in is producing food to the populations. Even the company motto is “feeding Indonesia”. We produce animal feeds and poultry products for Indonesian. This are all sold in the domestic market. To a lot of people, this industry is seen as dirty industry, however the bio security being put in place to ensure food safety and continuity of production are at international level.
One thing for sure is that there’s a lot of myth about chicken today growing too fast because of hormons being injected. This is not true. How chicken has grown so fast today is because of what chicken today eat is protein based diet such as corn and soya beans as compare to those days when our kampung chicken eat our leftover food. Over the years, there have been genetic selection which makes the difference. Its actually expensive to inject hormones into chicken and the viability is not there. If I go on about the science, there will be a lot more to share.
There are numerous challenges which we face everyday, what I can say is there is a continuous improvement in this country in everything. We can’t compare them to countries like Malaysia or Singapore but I believe one day they will be there.
MCJ : Being the CFO of your company, how does the new minimum wage impacting your industry (if any) and what are the steps you will be taking?
Vincent : The minimum wage rate does not affect our company significantly as our business operations are spread across Indonesia and some parts are only up to 10% increment only. Furthermore our industry is not labor intensive. We use a lot of machine to run the productions. The company has always emphasize on efficiency in production.
To us what we saw is that the increase in minimum wage rate has enable more Indonesia having more expandable income and they are able to spend on better protein food for the family and we are looking at demand consumption picking up for chickens.
MCJ : All the best to you Vincent. Now let’s talk about you. We understand you are an avid scuba diver, what motivates you and where and how often do you ‘dive’ into this?
Vincent : Being an outdoor person, I love nature and the sea especially. Diving is when I take a total break from work, for a simple reason nobody can reach me when I am underwater or in the open sea.
I make two dive trip a year. Each trip I try to do about 5 to 6 days and log about 9 to 12 dives. After each trip, I come back recharged and ready to take the next challenge. Normally I dive either in Bali or Manado.
MCJ : Would you care to explain a little bit about scuba diving as if talking to a person who have no knowledge about this and what must one do to become a scuba diver?
Vincent : Be comfortable with water and do not panic and follow the basic rules that have been taught when in class. Most of time accidents happens is because people get over-confident and do not follow rules.
Go for a proper dive class and have a good buddy to dive with you. At the same time, when you start diving, try to dive with people who are helpful and willing to share knowledge with you. That is how I pick up more diving experience. Your skill will not improve as much if you do not do these since there is no pressure to follow and compare another person.
I went through some challenging time when underwater, such as being hit by the current and lost my buddy and when I surface, being hit by high waves. This all have not deter me and I still love diving. How I survived is by following the rules and what your dive master have told you and keep calm. There have been time which I have to help another diver in difficult condition.
The key is do not compromise on safety, you do not need to be a hero and there is nothing to show off. You do not need to be a swimmer to dive. All you need to do is relax and be comfortable in water.
MCJ : Great! And finally, where is the best place to dive in Indonesia and why?
Vincent : So far I would say Manado. There are other more famous places such as Raja Ampat and Komodo. However, today I would go with Manado. It’s a great place to dive and you see a lot of rare sea creatures. You might even see dolphins when you travel by boat from Manado to Bunaken. Next reason to dive in Manado is its great customer service. They take really good care of you until the very end of your trip so much so that you will feel guilty if you do not tip them.
Thank you Pak Vincent.