History
Tunas Sawa Erma (TSE) Group started its journey in the palm oil plantation business in 1998 in Boven Digoel and Merauke, Papua. Until 2021, TSE Group through its subsidiaries already has eight palm oil plantations located in the Boven Digoel and Merauke districts, Papua, also Halmahera districts, North Maluku. They are under the domain of PT Tunas Sawa Erma (TSE), PT Dongin Prabhawa (DP), PT Berkat Cipta Abadi (BCA), PT Gelora Mandiri Membangun (GMM), and PT Papua Agro Lestari (PAL).
TSE Group’s journey began when PT TSE obtained a Forest Area Release Permit from the Ministry of Forestry for 34 thousand hectares (ha) of land in Boven Digoel in 1998. In the same year, the company started planting oil palm seedlings on an area of 7,917 ha which has continued to grow to this day.
TSE Group has succeeded in planting oil palm plants in six active plantation areas which have an area of approximately 60 thousand ha. The total production of fresh fruit bunches is more than 3 million ton in the past three years. In November 2023, TSE B has transferred a 1.741 ha plot to Peran Serta Marga (PSM) Cooperative.
PT TSE has three plantation areas — POP-A, POP-B, and POP-E. Only POP-E has not planted oil palm due to the company’s policy to reinstate the temporary moratorium on new development.
A similar challenge occurs with BCA. To be precise, this is the POP-D area in Merauke. BCA has obtained a Right to Cultivate (HGU) permit for around 10 thousand ha, but it has not yet been planted.
In addition to POP-D, BCA has a plantation area at POP-C in Merauke, which started the process of planting oil palm in 2012. As of 2016, the area has reached 11 thousand ha, which decreased in 2020 due to the transfer to plasma land. BCA built a CPO mill in 2016 and its capacity grew in 2022.
DP for the first time started planting plantations in 2011 in Merauke. In 2016, DP also built a CPO mill and its capacity increased in 2022.
GMM, the only subsidiary of TSE Group located in Halmahera, acquired its Right to Cultivate permit for around 10 thousand ha wide area in 2016. GMM has just inaugurated its factory in 2022.
PAL which is based in Merauke, on RI-PNG border to be exact, received its Right to Cultivate permit in the same year as GMM for around 25 thousand ha wide area. PAL’s palm oil plantation has kept on growing since 2014 with around 4.200 ha of its area planted.