Guide

Oil palm replanting cost per hectare

Updated 23 October 2026. Prices and costs carry the date of their source. Also in Bahasa Indonesia.

Short answer: replanting a smallholder oil-palm estate in Indonesia, from felling to first harvest, is put at Rp50 million to Rp70 million per hectare by growers and their associations (2020 to 2024), and the government's smallholder replanting grant, PSR, has paid Rp60 million per hectare since 2025, for up to four hectares per household. The largest cost is not on any receipt: three to four years without a harvest.

Why replant at all

Palms past 25 years bear less and less; smallholder estates planted from uncertified seed never reach a decent yield in the first place. The Smallholder Replanting Programme, Peremajaan Sawit Rakyat or PSR, targets both: estates that "have passed their economic age of 25 years", that yield 10 tonnes of fresh fruit bunches per hectare per year or less at age seven or more, or that were planted from non-certified seed. The Ministry of Agriculture estimated 2.78 million hectares of smallholder estate as candidates (May 2020), and smallholders hold about 41 percent of Indonesia's 16.8 million hectares of oil palm.

What it costs per hectare

There is no single official figure, because the cost depends on how the old palms are felled, the state of the land, and the price of seedlings and fertiliser at the time. Figures that have been quoted:

  • Rp50 million per hectare from land preparation to production, according to growers in Landak, West Kalimantan (Mongabay Indonesia, August 2020).
  • Rp60 million per hectare according to the West Kalimantan smallholder association (Mongabay Indonesia, April 2021).
  • "Rp60 million to Rp70 million per hectare" based on field practice, according to the Oil Palm Smallholders Union, SPKS (Kontan, February 2024).

The components: felling and chipping or burying the old palms, clearing the land, certified seedlings, a cover crop, fertiliser, and upkeep through the three immature years.

The PSR grant: Rp60 million per hectare

The grant is funded from the palm oil export levy managed by BPDPKS, now BPDP. It has risen in steps: Rp25 million per hectare in 2018, Rp30 million later, and Rp60 million per hectare from 2025, for at most four hectares per household, "disbursed in two tranches" through a growers' institution rather than to individuals. The government hopes that covers the palms until they bear; against the growers' estimates above, it covers most of the physical cost, and the rest comes from the grower's own savings, credit or other income.

An individual cannot apply. A grower must "belong to a growers' institution", a farmer group or a cooperative, and "hold legal title to the land". In Mukomuko, Bengkulu, one producer cooperative manages 573.19 hectares of PSR land through a three-way agreement with BPDP and a bank; its officers say the cooperative route cut the application time to about nine months from as much as two years (Antara, February 2025). In Bengkulu the support comes in kind, as certified seedlings, fertiliser, and rice and secondary-crop seed for intercropping, across the four to five years of replanting.

The unwritten cost: years without harvest

New palms take about three to four years to bear and earn. The Ministry of Agriculture said in May 2026 that this is the main reason growers hesitate: "prices are high, and they do not want to lose the income". A grower whose estate is the only livelihood delays, and the palms get older. The advice is to replant in stages, two of four hectares first, and to intercrop. In Landak one grower made Rp500,000 to Rp600,000 a month from bananas between the young palms, which helps and is not enough to live on.

Delivery lags the plan. Against a target of 120,000 hectares a year, PSR reached 49,658 hectares in 2024 and 37,499 in 2025; the 2026 target was lowered to 50,000 hectares, and 9,063 had been done by 11 May 2026. The obstacles named are not money but land title, including estates inside the forest zone, and paperwork.

Questions people ask

Does the PSR grant have to be repaid?
No, PSR is a grant, not a loan. Confusion on this point has led growers to decline it. What can be a loan is the bank credit that covers the shortfall.
How many hectares does it cover at most?
Four hectares per household, so at most Rp240 million at the Rp60 million rate (Kontan, October 2026).
Who applies?
A farmer group, a federation of farmer groups or a cooperative whose members hold land title, through the district agriculture office or, in partnership with a company, directly to BPDP.

In the game

Sawit Simulator does not yet play out a full replanting. What it has is the small version: a palm that dies, is pulled for Ganoderma or burns leaves an empty slot, and the Replant button fills it from the seedlings you bought at the Workshop. A whole block can also be cleared; a crew fells every palm at a wage per palm, nothing is sold, and the bare land full of debris is what you plant again, immature years included.

The Workshop in the game is your village cooperative and the only buyer of fruit and seller of seedlings, fertiliser and crews, so it plays the role that cooperatives and farmer groups hold in the real programme. What is missing: the per-hectare grant, land title, and the queue of paperwork. A run ends in year 25, exactly when a real estate must start thinking about replanting, so the question of who pays for three years without a harvest arises in the game only on a block you clear yourself.

Play in the browser About Sawit Simulator Glossary

Sources

  1. Kontan, GAPKI dorong peremajaan sawit rakyat untuk dongkrak produktivitas, 15 October 2026 (Rp60 million per hectare, four hectares per household, 41 percent of 16.8 million hectares). In Indonesian. https://industri.kontan.co.id/news/gapki-dorong-peremajaan-sawit-rakyat-untuk-dongkrak-produktivitas
  2. Antara, Realisasi PSR 2026 baru capai 18 persen dari target, 19 May 2026 (targets and delivery 2024 to 2026). In Indonesian. https://www.antaranews.com/berita/5573144/realisasi-psr-2026-baru-capai-18-persen-dari-target
  3. Antara, Kementan: Program peremajaan sawit hadapi kendala partisipasi petani, 19 May 2026 (why growers hesitate). In Indonesian. https://www.antaranews.com/berita/5573077/kementan-program-peremajaan-sawit-hadapi-kendala-partisipasi-petani
  4. Antara, BPDP siapkan lima pendekatan percepat program PSR, 3 November 2025 (disbursement to October 2025). In Indonesian. https://www.antaranews.com/berita/5217653/bpdp-siapkan-lima-pendekatan-percepat-program-psr
  5. Antara, BPDP: Penyaluran peremajaan sawit rakyat Lampung Rp156,4 miliar, 21 May 2026 (two tranches, four hectares, growers' institutions). In Indonesian. https://www.antaranews.com/berita/5576487/bpdp-penyaluran-peremajaan-sawit-rakyat-lampung-rp1564-miliar
  6. Antara Bengkulu, Koperasi siap remajakan sawit rakyat di Mukomuko, 5 February 2025. In Indonesian. https://bengkulu.antaranews.com/berita/394193/koperasi-siap-remajakan-sawit-rakyat-di-mukomuko
  7. Antara Bengkulu, Bengkulu terima bantuan PSR pada 2025 sebesar Rp60 juta per hektare, 6 May 2024. In Indonesian. https://bengkulu.antaranews.com/berita/345084/bengkulu-terima-bantuan-psr-pada-2025-sebesar-rp60-juta-per-hektare
  8. Kontan, Dana replanting diusulkan naik jadi Rp 60 juta per hektare, ini respons petani sawit, 27 February 2024 (the Rp60 to 70 million estimate). In Indonesian. https://nasional.kontan.co.id/news/dana-replanting-diusulkan-naik-jadi-rp-60-juta-per-hektare-ini-respons-petani-sawit
  9. Directorate General of Estate Crops, Ministry of Agriculture, Kepastian, Kemanfaatan dan Keadilan Pelaksanaan Program PSR, 6 January 2023 (criteria and the institution requirement). In Indonesian. https://ditjenbun.pertanian.go.id/kepastian-kemanfaatan-dan-keadilan-pelaksanaan-program-psr-benar-dirasakan-petani/
  10. Mongabay Indonesia, Peremajaan kebun rakyat sembari tumpang sari di sela tanaman sawit, 27 April 2021. In Indonesian. https://mongabay.co.id/2021/04/27/peremajaan-kebun-rakyat-sembari-tumpang-sari-di-sela-tanaman-sawit/
  11. Mongabay Indonesia, Dilema peremajaan sawit rakyat di Kalimantan Barat, 25 August 2020. In Indonesian. https://mongabay.co.id/2020/08/25/dilema-peremajaan-sawit-rakyat-di-kalimantan-barat/
  12. Kontan, Kementan: ada 2,78 juta ha lahan sawit rakyat yang berpotensi diremajakan, 20 May 2020. In Indonesian. https://nasional.kontan.co.id/news/kementan-ada-278-juta-ha-lahan-sawit-rakyat-yang-berpotensi-diremajakan
  13. Kontan, Ada bantuan Rp 25 juta per hektare dari program peremajaan sawit rakyat, 9 May 2018. In Indonesian. https://industri.kontan.co.id/news/ada-bantuan-rp-25-juta-per-hektare-dari-program-peremajaan-sawit-rakyat

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