Jakarta, Sept. 11 -- The Agriculture Ministry, in partnership with the Oil Palm Plantation Fund Management Agency (BPDP), launched a national program to rejuvenate smallholder cocoa plantations and accelerate downstream processing to address declining national production.

Indonesia's standing as a global cocoa producer has dropped from third to seventh place, with current annual output reaching 200,000 tons.

The decline is driven by aging trees and low land productivity, which averages 700 to 800 kilograms per hectare-well below the international benchmark of 1.5 tons per hectare.

The ministry's Director of Plantation Seeds Ebi Rulianti stated in a statement on Friday that the government has targeted 247,260 hectares of smallholder coc...