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Government works to improve productivity of oil palm plantation
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This photograph taken on Jan. 28 shows an oil palm plantation in Palembang, South Sumatra. (Antara/Nova Wahyudi)
T
he government has prepared 30,000 hectares of land for an oil palm replanting pilot project to increase productivity of the industry.
"As a pilot project, we will replant oil palm trees on 30,000 ha of land," Agrarian and Spatial Planning Minister Sofyan Djalil said in Jakarta on Monday.
The replanting project would be in an area where cooperatives were running strongly, given that cooperatives were expected to become the main players in the project, Sofyan added.
“If the first phase of the project is successful, there will be more projects in the following years," Sofjan said, as reported by news agency Antara.
Meanwhile, Coordinating Economic Minister Darmin Nasution explained that oil palm replanting was necessary to avoid increasingly complicated issues, including pressure from the buyers.
The replanting project would be jointly implemented by the Agriculture Ministry and the Plantation Fund Management Board for Palm Oil, said Darmin.
In addition to the replanting campaign, the government will also run a similar program on rubber plantation in 2018, targeting more than 15,000 ha of land.
Indonesia is the world’s largest palm oil producer. It has around 11.6 million hectares of oil palm plantations and produced some 35 million tons of palm oil in 2016. Around 16 million workers are employed in the palm oil industry. (bbn)
