As a coastal village in Central Kalimantan, the farmers in Sabuai village cultivate coconut agroforests. The coconut agroforests, which are located in mostly muddy sands or peatland, are often intercropped with coffee, bananas, mango, sugar cane, and vegetables.

Despite their centrality to the local economy, the productivity and income generated from coconut agroforests are rather low. The farmers who harvest coconuts are mostly older people and the labour is limited and arduous. Consequently, these agroforests are at risk of being converted to monocultures or cleared entirely if the productivity and profitability cannot be improved.
We explored the use of a simple technology for harvesting coconut as a way to increase productivity and income. We trialed the use of a Ponkod, a mechanical coconut tree climber, with the local communities to see if it would simplify tree climbing while reducing risk to the climbers. The Ponkod was selected based on the availability of the technology in Indonesia as well as its cost effectiveness compared with other options.

After trials with the farmers, however, we found that the technology was not easily adopted by coconut farmers. One of the issues was that farmers spent more time preparing and operating heavy and inflexible equipment, which slowed the pace of coconut harvesting.

Intervention Details
Number of farmers supported: 10 farmers
Total land area intervened: ± 8-10 hectares
Technology introduced: Ponkod (climbing technology for harvesting coconut trees)
Impact: The 'Ponkod' technology did suit the needs of targeted farmers
Lessons learned:
Climbing coconut trees has many risks for farmers so finding alternative technologies is needed. Technologies, however, should suit the needs and preferences of farmers.

Next steps
As an alternative to testing climbing technologies, we will work with local communities, in collaboration with a consumer goods company, to test planting dwarf coconuts on degraded lands. As these trees are much shorter, harvesting is much easier and planting will be trialed as part of agroforestry systems.