TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Agrinas is redundant for oil palm plantations
The measure is totally inconsistent with the government drive for improving the efficiency of its fiscal and economic management.
Change text size
Gift Premium Articles
to Anyone
Share the best of The Jakarta Post with friends, family, or colleagues. As a subscriber, you can gift 3 to 5 articles each month that anyone can read—no subscription needed!
Workers load oil palm fruit bunches onto a truck at a plantation belonging to state-owned PT Perkebunan Nusantara II in Deli Serdang regency, North Sumatra, on Nov. 19, 2024. (Antara/Yudi Manar)
S
trong law enforcement measures taken recently by the government against oil palm plantations cultivated on forested land have stirred uncertainty and sent shockwaves throughout the palm oil industry.
Over the past few weeks, a special task force set up to bring order into the palm oil sector has confiscated more than 300,000 hectares of plantation in 19 provinces without going through legal due process for allegedly violating the Forestry Law.
“We will hand over the confiscated plantations to state-owned PT Agrinas Palma Nusantara”, said the task force chief Maj. Gen. Yusman Madayun on March 17.
Earlier on March 10, the Attorney General’s Office (AGO) handed over to Agrinas Palma Nusantara (Agrinas) 221,000 ha of oil palm estate in Riau which were seized from the private company PT Duta Palma for violating the Forestry Law. However, this case had been settled in court.
But immediate confiscation of the oil palm estates by the special task force without going through legal due process could damage business certainty in the palm oil industry, which has become increasingly vital as a major source of food, renewable energy, employment and foreign exchange.
Yet more flabbergasting is the government’s decision in February to set up another state-owned enterprise (SOE), Agrinas, specially to manage the confiscated plantations. This measure is totally inconsistent with the nationally praised government drive for improving the efficiency of its fiscal and economic management.
