Optimizing Clustering Analysis to Identify High-Potential Markets for Indonesian Tuber Exports

Agriculture is a key contributor to Indonesia's economic growth, with tubers representing the second most important food crop. Despite their significance, the export value of Indonesia’s tuber crops has not yet reached its full potential given the decline in the value of tuber exports since 2021. One of the contributing factors is the restricted range of export market options. This study aims to analyze export trade patterns to identify the most high-potential markets for Indonesian tuber commodities.  Clustering analysis is used as a key method to identify market locations by grouping countries based on similar trade characteristics. Clustering was conducted using the Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM), which enhanced by Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) and evaluated by silhouette score and DBI. The dataset is collected from Indonesia’s Central Bureau of Statistics from 2019 to 2023, focusing on 5 kinds of tuber exports with total of 455 entries and 8 columns. Using the AIC/BIC method, the optimal number of clusters obtained is 2 which are low market opportunities (cluster 0) and high market oppurtunities (cluster 1). Results showed that the GMM model without optimization has silhouette score of 0.7602 and DBI of 0.8398, while the GMM+PSO model achieved an improved silhouette score of 0.8884 and DBI of 0.5584. Both score are categorized as strong structure but, GMM+PSO has higher silhouette score and lower DBI score, demonstrating the effectiveness of PSO in enhancing the clustering model’s performance. The key potential markets for Indonesian tuber exports are primarily concentrated in Asia, including countries such as China, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, Hong Kong, and United States.