REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA -- The agriculture insurance program, particularly that related to food crop plantation, with the premium borne by the government should be realized this year, an economist said.

"The government should be able to guarantee and provide the insurance premium to farmers because it already has ample fiscal room in the state budget," Director of the Institute for the Development of Economics and Finance (Indef) Enny Sri Hartarti stated here on Wednesday (7/1).

She added that the government had ample fiscal room in the 2015 state budget after it cut down subsidies and expenditures of government ministries/institutions.

"The need for the insurance could be mapped out later. It is not necessary that the insurance has to be given to all types of commodities, such as rice," she remarked.