Biochar for Palm Oil Nurseries

There are about 250 producers of palm oil seedlings in Indonesia, and with an area of the palm oil plantation reaching around 15 million hectares, these seedling producers are actually not many either. More specifically, Sumatra island has the largest area of palm oil plantations in Indonesia, making it the main economic activity in the area, because 70 percent of palm oil land in Indonesia is in Sumatra. With a cropping pattern, for example, 125 trees per hectare, 125,000 trees are needed for every 1,000 hectares or 1 million hectares for 125 million trees, while 15 million hectares means more than 1.8 trillion palm oil trees with current crude palm oil (CPO) production reaching more than 40 million tons per year. A very large number, of course. But not only the quantity factor, the seed quality factor is prioritized so that it has optimal productivity. Of course, the need for seeds does not necessarily mean millions or trillions of trees at the same time, depending on needs such as new plantings from new plantations (extensification) - which is currently being carried out in Indonesia or rejuvenation of palm oil plantations (replanting) which is carried out periodically.

One of the good palm oil seeds is determined by the quality of the growing media. The growing medium for palm oil seedlings generally consists of topsoil mixed with sand or organic matter to obtain a fertile medium. Compost or manure is often used to improve soil fertility by supplying nutrients to plants. With a tropical climate with high rainfall, nutrients can be easily washed away, besides that, low soil pH is also a separate obstacle for the growth of these seeds. By using biochar, nutrients or plant nutrients become more available, humidity and microbial activity will increase. This makes the quality of the planting medium high quality, so that the resulting palm oil seed products in the form of roots, plant height, number of leaves and plant weight are the parameters observed with the use of biochar which are also getting better.

Compared to using cocopeat, biochar has a number of advantages. Both cocopeat and biochar have uses in agriculture, but there are a number of differences between the two. Cocopeat has uses mainly as a planting medium because of its water holding capacity, while biochar besides having the ability to hold water like cocopeat also raises soil pH, holds or makes nutrients more available (nutrient retention), and also becomes a soil microbial colony so that Organic materials become quickly decomposed and absorbed by plants. Cocopeat will also decompose in a short time like compost, while biochar can survive and not decompose for hundreds of years. Under these conditions, biochar is also used to store CO2 (carbon sequestration) and obtain carbon credits with the carbon sink mechanism.

The palm oil nursery is the starting point that most determines the further growth of the palm oil in the field. The success of growing palm oil plants in the field is largely determined by the quality of the seeds planted. Seedlings that grow well in nurseries have high adaptability in the field. In practice, it has been proven by a number of studies that the use of biochar has a positive effect on palm seed products. The use of biochar in the range of 40% has become the best composition for the planting medium for the palm oil seeds. This should encourage producers of palm oil seeds to use biochar. If there is a need for biochar in large quantities for this purpose, please contact us. We can also provide technical specification data (COA) and also the biochar samples.