PETALING JAYA: Permaju Industries Bhd (PIB) via its wholly owned subsidiary Genbayu Gemilang Sdn Bhd has partnered with Malaysian Cocoa Board to jointly develop and manage a 100ha plantation site in Mukim Setul, Negri Sembilan.
The site will house Malaysia’s first and largest single origin smart cocoa plantation, with PIB allocating RM15 million over the next seven years to kickstart its plantation division while adhering with global environment, social and corporate governance (ESG) criteria for its operations.
Malaysian cocoa industry contributed RM1.64 billion to GDP in 2020. PIB, who has a timber portfolio previously, is moving towards achieving its ESG goals by diversifying to single origin cocoa plantation, which have lower environmental footprint and a quicker turnaround time resulting in better yield.
PIB will be partnering with Agrocloud Sdn Bhd to develop a customised plantation Decision Support System platform named Cocoa Plantation Management System (CPMS). Agrocloud is supported by its exclusive Austrian technology partner Pessl Instruments GmbH that brings over 35 years of experience in Agri IoT and Agri Advisory services. CPMS is a holistic management platform integrating various technologies to deliver plantation operators with a streamlined tool comprising all aspects of agronomic advisory, governance and traceability. Core to this platform is the range of IoT field sensors supplied by Pessl Instruments that will be monitoring environmental parameters in real time to ensure optimal agronomic conditions is maintained. The implementation of this technology combined with the technical knowledge transfer from the Malaysian Cocoa Board will make this plantation the first fully integrated smart cocoa plantation in the country and will serve as a blueprint for PIB’s future expansion.
Malaysia’s cocoa-based products grown rapidly in the global market and have extensive market coverage to more than 100 destinations worldwide. In the first half of 2021, export revenue from cocoa stands at RM3.37 billion.
