Best Management Practice for Maximum Economic Yield in Oil Palm (BMP-OP II)

The IPNI Southeast Asia Program has been instrumental in developing a best management practice (BMP) concept for yield intensification in oil palm during 2001-2005. The BMP approach is now undergoing wider scale evaluation with six collaborating plantations in Indonesia since 2006. With this new program, IPNI promotes BMPs as a management tool in mature plantations, where a set of site-specific BMPs are implemented in a number of full-size management blocks representative for the estate(s) to collect evidence on the agronomic, economic, and environmental performance of the chosen BMPs.

Fresh fruit bunch (FFB) yield was greater with BMP compared to yield in reference (REF) blocks at all six project sites, albeit the available data were for differing periods of recording. At one site, the overall yield gain with BMP in the first year was small, presumably because harvesting standards were already high and yields of more than 31 t/ha FFB were achieved even without BMP. At two other sites, yield increases with BMP ranged from 4.6 to 5.8 t/ha (additional 19 and 32%, respectively) after 10 to 12 months of harvesting. Yield advantages at remaining sites ranged from 0.2 to 0.7 t/ha after 3 to 6 months of yield recording. Early yield increases with BMPs were attributed to giving the highest priority to crop recovery BMPs at the start of the projects. Short harvesting cycles with 7-day rounds led to lower harvest losses in the field compared to the REF, but also affected daily yield per harvester and total harvester requirements. Once the first year of data recording is completed at all six sites, a detailed analysis will be conducted to evaluate the effect of short harvesting rounds on economic benefit, harvester income, and labor requirements. Other field management BMPs will have an impact on yield later in the projects, as overall field and palm conditions improve. Priorities in 2008 include a continuation of BMP implementation at project sites and the promotion of BMP as a management tool through publications, workshops, and seminars. Southeast Asia-03