13/05/2011 (Bernama) -- Indonesia's crude palm oil (CPO) output is projected to reach 40 million tonnes in the next 10 years, Antara reported former agriculture minister Bungaran Saragih as saying.

The target could be achieved if the government focused on increasing the productivity of oil palm, he said at an international conference & exhibition on palm oil (ICE-PO) at the Jakarta Convention Centre Wednesday.

"Today, the area of land is limited so it is impossible to expand oil palm plantations. What we can do to raise production is increasing the productivity of oil palm," he said.

The productivity of oil palm currently stands at three tonnes per hectare while the national CPO output stood at 22-23 million tons per year, he said.

To reach CPO production of 40 million tonnes a year, the productivity of oil palm must be raised to six tonnes from the tonnes per hectare, he said.

He put the blame on poor cultivation for the low productivity of the country's oil palm.

Meanwhile, Chief of the Indonesian Plantation Businessmen Association (GPPI) Soedjai Kartasasmita predicted that the palm oil industry would have bright prospects.

In the next five years the global population would increase, leading to a rise in food demand particularly vegetable oil, he said.

"The increase in the use of bio-fuels will also increase CPO demand," he said.