San Afri Awang, Director General of Spatial Forestry Planning at Indonesia's Environment Ministry, said the moratorium will also include (1) plantation concessions that are not used in accordance with the prevailing stipulations, (2) plantation concessions transferred to a new owner, and (3) plantation concessions that include productive forested areas.

Indonesia, the world's biggest producer and exporter of crude palm oil (CPO), has approximately 11.4 million hectares of palm oil plantations. Although the government does not aim to curtail palm oil production (instead encouraging the optimization of production at existing plantations), the Indonesian Palm Oil Association (Gapki) says the moratorium threatens growth of palm oil output as well as investment in this industry because - if the moratorium indeed also covers existing concessions - it shows a lack of legal certainty.

Read more: Palm Oil Industry Indonesia: Five-Year Moratorium on New Concessions

Indonesia's Palm Oil Production and Export Statistics:

  2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015  2016
Production
(million tons)
 19.2  19.4  21.8  23.5 26.5  30.0  31.5  32.5  31.0¹
Export
(million tons)
 15.1  17.1  17.1  17.6 18.2  22.4  21.7  26.4  25.0¹
Export
(in USD billion)
 15.6  10.0  16.4  20.2 21.6  20.6  21.1  18.6  17.0¹

¹ indicates forecast
Sources: Indonesian Palm Oil Producers Association (Gapki) & Indonesian Ministry of Agriculture

Do you agree with Indonesia's moratorium on palm oil concessions?

Voting possible:  -

Results

  • Yes, Indonesia needs to raise efforts to protect the environment (80.4%)
  • No, an expanding palm oil industry creates jobs and brings forex earnings (14.3%)
  • I don't know (5.4%)

Total amount of votes: 112

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Discuss

Misja Alexander |

Without including existing concessions, the moratorium would have limited impact because the big Indonesian palm oil companies have ample unplanted concessioned areas at their disposal, ergo without issuing new concessions there is plenty of room for growth (for the big companies that is)