Asian Agri recently rewarded six out of nine fire-fire villages in Riau which have committed to guarding their village areas from forest and land fires.
The six villages were Lubuk Ogong, Rantau Baru, Tambak, Sotol, Lalang Kabung and Delik.
“Today, we are giving rewards to six fire-free villages – five villages which have managed to prevent all the fires in their villages and one village which had fires across less than one hectare of land,” said Welly Pardede, Asian Agri Head of Sustainability Operations & CSR.
Asian Agri gave out IDR 100 million each to the five villages which had experienced zero fires, and IDR 50 million to the village which experienced less than one hectare of fire. The money will be used for the construction of public facilities in the villages.
These rewards were handed out as part of the Asian Agri Fire-Free Village Program, which the company runs as part of its commitment in preventing fires which are often carried out by villagers around Asian Agri’s operational areas.
The Fire-Free Village Program of the 2017/2018 period succeeded in reducing the number of land fires occurring in the Riau and Jambi provinces, down from 398 hectares in 2016 to 82 hectares in 2017.
