CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION

Bird’s nest business has been growing rapidly over the years. It is proved by the fact that there are more and more house-like structures built by merchants that attract wild swiftlets to build nests in them can be found in productive and potential areas. Although the risk is quite high, many shareholders are still willing to invest in order to obtain bird’s nest which has high economical value. It is not easy to do this business. The businesspersons that want to start this business are required to have strong capital as this is a long term investment. They also have to understand the behaviour and biological nature of the swiftlets well so that they would not make any mistake in their approach to attract those swiftlets into making nests in their buildings. Other than that, luck factor also does determine the success or failure of this business.

Indonesia is estimated to have around 12000 of swiftlets’ houses spread out mainly in Java and Sumatra. With production of 100 – 120 tonnes every year, Indonesia could supply 80% of the world’s market demand. The swiftlets were once only live in caves, but now they start to move out to live in buildings within city areas. Not only in Indonesia, countries like Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam have also started to set up buildings meant to attract the swiftlets to live there which subsequently will start making nests in their respective buildings. With the increasing trend of setting up swiftlets’ houses, the production and quality of the nests are expected to have improved in the future.

1.1 Motivation of Study
Being a person that one day wants to own a bird’s nest business, I have always been kept well informed of the latest news and trend of the bird’s nest industry. For me, I have a vision to set up buildings that produce bird’s nest in Indonesia, and then export it to China. The purpose of