Small Island Economic Independent

In Indonesia we have about 17,500 islands. In general, only a dozen are known to us, namely those that are large or have special potential such as mining products and tourism objects. Even this is not in the thousands.

So what happened to the tens of thousands of other small islands? This is actually the challenge of development since Indonesia’s independence 77 years ago, how to bring prosperity that is evenly distributed to all corners of the country — including the remote, farthest and foremost islands.

One of the challenges on a small island is the supply of energy, both for electricity and fuel. Generally transported very far from the nearest large island. As a result, if the island has both natural and marine products, the cost of transportation to the nearest market is still very expensive. As a result, these small islands are difficult to compete in the economic field.

So the solution that I offer can be tried by the community or local government whose territory has small islands.

Tamanu trees generally grow very well even on very small islands. This tamanu tree is one of the future industrial materials because the world is ready to leave fossils for energy and other industrial raw materials.

Tamanu’s potential apart from energy is for the wellness industry such as antiaging, skin care, hair care and the like, as well as for an even higher value industry, namely the phytopharmaceuticals industry — a plant-based pharmaceutical industry.

A number of studies have been carried out that show the potential of tamanu to cure cancer, heart, HIV, migraine, bleeding, wound healing, cell reproduction, collagen production and the long list of drugs that can be produced from tamanu continues to grow.

So how can a small island be economically independent with this tamanu? High calorie biomass from tamanu seed shells is used for electricity, hot-pressed oil for local fuel, while cold-pressed oil and its phytopharmaceuticals products are the mainstay of ‘exports’ to big islands/overseas. These products have high value, so they are feasible even if they have to be transported with expensive transportation costs.

We in New Energy Asia (nue.asia) is providing end to end services for this tamanu-based industry. Start from nursery, plantation, plant management, harvest/post harvest, market planing, industrialization, derivative product development etc.