BPDPKS Holds Training on Online Application for Oil Palm Replanting

The Indonesia Oil Palm Plantation Fund Management Agency (BPDPKS) held a training on use of online application for Oil Palm Replanting (PSR Online) II in Jakarta, 1-3 May 2019. This was the second one after the first held a week earlier. About 130 representatives of provinces and regencies participated in the program which was held at Hotel Borobudor Jakarta. “Administrative constraints caused slow PSR implementation as yet.

This Online PSR is expected to speed up the implementation of PSR,” Edi Subiantoro, a representative of Directorate General Plantations of Agriculture Ministry said in his remark in the closing ceremony of the training, (3/5/2019). Attendees at the closing ceremony included Fund Collection Director of BPDPKS Herdrajat Natawijaya, Head of General dan HRD Division of BPDPKS Suharman, and Head of Plantations at Coordinating Economic Ministry Muhammad Saefulloh. PSR is a replanting program for oil palm plantation owned by smallholders. For this year,

it is targeted to replant 200 thousand hectares smallholders’ plantations. In this program, BPDPKS support farmers by disbursing grant of Rp25 million per hectares. In 2018, the government missed the target to replace oil palm trees in 185 thousand hectares of plantations because of technical issues, particularly because most of the technical recommendations for the program were only received by the BPDPKS late last year.

“We expect this online application will speed up the process so that we can attain our target to replant 200 thousand hectares this year,” Edi added. At the same time, Muhammad Saefulloh said that the training program is expected to leave the participants with a solid understanding of what has to be done to operate PSR Online application as well as to encourage them to solve current problems.

“PSR Online application is expected to be a tool to solve problems in completing PSR requirements. This is only the beginning an it still needs to be improved. But one thing is certain, all participants are expected to be the problem solvers in their areas,” he said. PSR Online is an application provided by BPDPKS to ease and speed up implementation of PSR. Using this application, smallholders who participate in PSR are not obliged to complete requirements manually anymore as the data and documents can be submitted online. Using manual system, all required data and documents must be submitted in hardcopy format. It took long time to submit and verify the data and caused slow PSR implementation. However, using online application all the process can be simplified and it makes possible for BPDPKS to speed up fund disbursement. It also makes easier for BPDPKS and Ministry of Agriculture to monitor the whole program. ***