Asian Agri announced on 15 March 2016 a joint collaboration with IDH (The Sustainable Trade Initiative) and SETARA to empower independent palm oil smallholders in Indonesia.
The palm oil producer has spent the last 30 years cultivating smallholder partnerships under the Plasma and KKPA schemes, in which it has implemented an array of programmes that have brought significant improvements to partnered smallholders’ living standards, in addition to the adoption of sustainable agronomic practices and good quality seedlings.
Asian Agri aims to partner independent smallholders managing a total plantation of 60,000 hectares.
To support these partnerships, the company launched the Independent Smallholders Assistance Programme in 2012. The programme draws on the company’s experiences partnering Plasma and KKPA smallholders, and has as of end 2015 benefited over 5,000 independent smallholders managing over 18,000 hectares of plantations.
