25/11/2008 (Reuters), Jakarta - Indonesia's largest listed palm oil firm, PT Astra Agro Lestari Tbk, expects its palm oil output to remain flat in 2009 as plantations hit maximum capacity, Vice President Director Tonny Hermawan said on Tuesday.

Astra Agro accounts for about 5 percent of total crude palm oil output in Indonesia, the world's largest producer of the commodity.

"Our production next year will be more or less equal to this year's because the trees have reached the ages that they can deliver maximum production," Hermawan told a gathering of investors.

The company has previously said it aimed to boost palm oil output by 7.5 percent to 990,000 tonnes in 2008, on the back of better productivity and larger plantation areas.

In the first ten months of this year, Astra Agro produced 817,780 tonnes of crude palm oil, up from 730,297 tonnes in the year-ago period.

Hermawan said the company had total planted area of 252,721 hectares at the end of October, up 10.4 percent from 228,862 hectares a year ago.

The average age of the oil palm trees was 14 years, Tjahyo Dwi Ariantono, Astra Agro's investor relations officer, said.

Astra benefited from soaring palm oil prices earlier this year but as commodity prices have collapsed it has seen palm oil lose nearly two thirds of its value from a March record high of 4,486 ringgit.