PALMOILMAGAZINE, MAMUJU — During the 2024 Forum Perangkat Daerah held at the Grand Maleo Hotel & Convention in Mamuju, West Sulawesi Province, on Friday, March 8, 2024, Herdin Ismail, the Head of the Plantation Agency of West Sulawesi Province, outlined the direction of plantation development leading up to 2025.
He emphasized that the primary focus of plantation development in the province for 2025 will be to increase the production of cocoa, coffee, coconut, and palm oil through initiatives such as improved seed quality and pest control measures. However, alongside increasing production, certain considerations need attention.
Firstly, Herdin highlighted the importance of anticipating the impacts of climate change to mitigate potential economic losses, particularly for farmers. Secondly, he stressed the need for sustainable plantation development, particularly concerning cocoa and palm oil.
He underscored the goal for every smallholder to obtain Indonesian Sustainable Palm Oil (ISPO) certification by 2024, and efforts are underway within the related ministries to formulate a sustainable certification for cocoa.
“In 2025, every smallholder should get ISPO certificate. Besides, related ministry is formulating the program about cocoa cultivation documents that should also get sustainable certificate,” he said, as Palmoilmagazine.com quoted from the official page of West Sulawesi Province, Monday (11/3/2024).
It also needs to develop farmers’ human resources namely about sustainable cultivation. Herdin thought there are some strategic issues to notice when formulating work plans in 2024. The first, the synchronization of target among the central, province, regency/city governments. The second, plantation commodity downstream management. The third, seeds independence program to guarantee the seeds in farmers/smallholders’ levels. The fourth, commodity price escalation namely cocoa, should be the chance to recover the people’s will to cultivate it.
He also acknowledged that to realize the goals would not be easy. There would be lots of issues to face. But by having programs and activities well, he believed, everything is possible by hoping that the forum should start with concrete thing heading to sustainable plantation development, which is, ‘to get the glory of plantation in West Sulawesi’. (T2)
