Moratorium, How Large is the Oil Palm Plantation Area?

The government has decided to temporarily halt the expansion of palm oil plantations for three years. A Presidential Instruction (Inpres) regarding a moratorium on palm oil land was signed by President Joko Widodo on September 19, 2018. The average annual growth rate of palm oil plantation area from 1970 to 2017 reached 10.31%.

Based on data from the Ministry of Agriculture's Center for Data and Agricultural Information Systems, the area of palm oil plantations in Indonesia reaches 12.3 million hectares (ha). This comprises People's Plantations (PR) of 4.76 million ha, Large State Plantations (PNB) of 753 thousand ha, and Large Private Plantations (PBS) of 6.8 million ha. National palm oil production reached 35.36 million tons with a productivity of 3.82 kg/ha.

The palm oil land moratorium aims to evaluate licensing and increase the productivity of palm oil plantations. Furthermore, it aims to improve the sustainable management of palm oil plantations. As is known, many businesses in the palm oil plantation sector still lack Indonesia Sustainable Palm Oil (ISPO) certification.