How far apart are oil palms planted?
Short answer: about 9 metres apart, in equilateral triangles, which fits 143 palms on a hectare. Indonesia’s planting guideline lists densities from 128 to 150 palms per hectare and asks growers to choose by planting material, soil fertility, terrain and local conditions.
Why triangles
In an equilateral triangle every palm stands the same distance from six neighbours, so the crowns share the light evenly. Each row is shifted half a space from the one before. The same 9 metres laid out as a square fits only about 123 palms on a hectare, so the triangle gets roughly 15 percent more palms out of the same land without crowding them.
The guideline sets rows generally north to south. On hills the rows follow the terrain instead.
The standard spacings
These are the recommended spacings in the Ministry of Agriculture’s oil palm guideline, from a PPKS table of 2009. Distances are in metres.
| In the row | Between rows | Palms per ha |
|---|---|---|
| 9.50 | 8.23 | 128 |
| 9.42 | 8.16 | 130 |
| 9.20 | 7.97 | 136 |
| 9.10 | 7.70 | 143 |
| 8.77 | 7.60 | 150 |
The guideline adds one special case. Where Ganoderma, the basal stem rot fungus, is endemic, it recommends 148 to 150 palms per hectare, so that enough productive palms are still standing at age 25 after the disease has taken its share.
Closer is not better
More palms per hectare means more bunches early, and trouble later. The guideline lists what a crowded block does: the palms grow tall reaching for light, compete for nutrients and photosynthesise less, the share of female flowers changes, bunches get lighter, trunks thinner and fronds longer.
Research agrees on the shape of it. A spacing trial in Nigeria found that after 12 years the densest plots, 190 palms per hectare, still led on cumulative yield, but that competition for light keeps growing with the palms. Projected over the whole cycle, the best density was 143 to 160 palms per hectare, a spacing of 8.5 to 9 metres. A 2024 study at an estate in Kapuas Hulu, West Kalimantan, compared 130, 136 and 143 palms per hectare and found the two lower densities producing better, with 136 ahead of 143 by 19.8 to 29.8 percent.
Holes and seedlings
- Planting holes are dug a month ahead, to let the soil’s acidity drop. The guideline gives 60 x 60 x 40 cm where the land was tilled by machine and 90 x 90 x 60 cm where weeds were cleared selectively with herbicide.
- Against Ganoderma a big hole is dug by machine, 2 x 2 metres at the top and 0.6 metres deep, and filled with 125 kg of empty fruit bunches after planting.
- A weeded circle 1 metre wide is opened around each new palm.
- Nurseries raise more seedlings than the field needs, to allow for culling. For 143 palms per hectare the guideline counts 200 sprouted seeds per hectare.
Questions people ask
- How many oil palms are planted per hectare?
- Between 128 and 150 in the Indonesian recommendations. The most common figure, 143, comes from about 9 metres between palms in triangles.
- What is the standard oil palm spacing?
- About 9 metres between palms in an equilateral triangle. The Indonesian table gives 9.10 metres within the row and 7.70 between rows for 143 palms.
- Is square planting worse than triangular?
- At the same distance a square holds fewer palms, about 123 per hectare at 9 metres, and leaves the light less evenly shared. Triangles are the standard.
- Does closer planting give more fruit?
- In the first years, per hectare, yes. As the crowns close, palms compete for light, grow tall and bear less, and over a full cycle studies favour 136 to 160 palms per hectare.
In the game
A block in Sawit Simulator is one hectare holding 144 palms: a 12 by 12 grid laid out as the real triangles, with every other row shifted half a space so that each palm has six neighbours. That is one palm more than the textbook 143, rounded so the grid stays square.
The triangle is not decoration. Ganoderma in the game spreads root to root along exactly those six neighbours, so one sick palm in the middle of a block threatens six others, and a trench around it is how you stop it.
Sources
- Ministry of Agriculture, Annex to Permentan No. 131/Permentan/OT.140/12/2013, Pedoman Budidaya Kelapa Sawit yang Baik, 31 December 2013 (spacing Table 14 from PPKS 2009, Ganoderma areas, row direction, planting holes, seedling count). In Indonesian. https://peraturan.bpk.go.id/Download/152995/Lamp.%20Permentan%20Nomor%20131%20Tahun%202013.pdf
- Bonneau, Impens, Buabeng and Van Damme, Optimum Oil Palm Planting Density for West Africa, Tropentag 2018, Ghent (12-year spacing trial in Nigeria). https://www.tropentag.de/2018/abstracts/html/495.php
- Parwati, Nadeak and Kautsar, Analisis Pertumbuhan dan Produktivitas Kelapa Sawit pada Variasi Kerapatan Tanam, Jurnal Agro Industri Perkebunan 12(2), 2024 (130, 136 and 143 palms per hectare in Kapuas Hulu). In Indonesian. https://jurnal.polinela.ac.id/index.php/AIP/article/view/3535