PALMOILMAGAZINE, JAKARTA – Indonesia’s elected President, Prabowo Subianto, revealed data indicating a revenue leak of up to Rp 300 trillion from the palm oil plantation sector. This information was shared by Hashim Djojohadikusumo, Vice Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Partai Gerindra and Prabowo’s younger brother.
Hashim explained that the data was obtained from Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, the Coordinating Minister for Maritime and Investment, as well as the Financial and Development Supervisory Board, and was confirmed by the Ministry of Environment and Forestry (MEF).
“It appears that unscrupulous stakeholders have cultivated millions of hectares of forest land for palm oil plantations. Despite warnings, they have failed to meet their obligations, potentially costing the country around Rp 300 trillion,” Hashim stated during a discussion with international business representatives at the Indonesian Chambers in South Jakarta on Monday.
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He added that approximately 300 stakeholders are responsible for the revenue leak and that preventive measures, including “friendly reminders,” will be implemented to ensure compliance.
“If we can address this leak, the country could gain an additional Rp 50 trillion annually. With that amount, we could provide free meals twice a day for around 9 million students,” Hashim said, as reported by Palmoilmagazine.com from detik.com on October 14, 2024.
Prior, Pandjaitan got the names of palm oil plantation companies to report their plantations and permit evidences they got. The government itself through palm oil joint task force used satellite image and drone to veify their reports.
Pandjaitan emphasized the companies that reported their information through sistim informasi perijinan perkebunan (SIPERIBUN) since July to August 2023 should qualify every term and condition. The task force still develops the dashboard to accomplish palm oil cases in forest regions that might be tracked down directly.
Quoted from CNN Indonesia, Chairman of Indonesian Palm Oil Association (IPOA), Eddy Martono said the accusation might be from palm oil plantation bleaching program that the government conducted. Based on the report from the task force and Financial and Development Supervisory Board, some companies were found to operate in forest regions without having permits.
Eddy thought that the members of IPOA qualified their obligation about Chapter 110 A, Undang-Undang Cipta Kerja that delivered permission for palm oil plantation companies to operate in forest regions to keep operating if they qualified the terms and condition in three years. But in Chapter 110 B that obliged to pay the administrative fine, the stakeholders should wait for the official documents published by Ministry of Environment and Forestry (MEF).
Eddy thought the administrative fine to pay from the violation in Chapter 110 B would be about Rp 100 million to Rp 130 million per hectares. But until now there is no official information from MEF that instructs to pay it. (P2)