Country agriculture profile · East Asia & Pacific
Indonesia
Indonesia is a vast tropical archipelago where smallholder farming and large plantation estates coexist across thousands of islands. It is one of the world’s largest rice producers — rice being the dominant staple — and a leading global producer and exporter of palm oil, alongside significant coffee, cocoa, rubber, and coconut. Systems range from intensive irrigated rice on Java’s fertile volcanic soils to extensive tree-crop cultivation on the outer islands.
Farming systems (stable overview)
Climate zones
- Tropical rainforest (equatorial, humid)
- Tropical monsoon
Agroecological zones
- Intensive lowland wet-rice zones, especially volcanic-soil Java
- Tree-crop plantation belts of Sumatra and Kalimantan
- Upland smallholder mixed-farming areas
Dominant crop systems
- Irrigated and rainfed lowland rice (sawah), concentrated on Java
- Smallholder and estate oil palm across Sumatra and Kalimantan
- Smallholder tree crops — coffee, cocoa, rubber, and coconut
- Upland maize and cassava
Major livestock systems
- Smallholder mixed cattle and small ruminants (goats and sheep)
- Rapidly expanding commercial poultry (broilers and layers)
- Backyard pigs in non-Muslim-majority regions
Irrigation: Extensive gravity and technical irrigation supports intensive lowland rice, especially on Java, though many systems face aging infrastructure and competing water demand.
Latest verified data
Each value is the most recent available observation, shown with its own year and unit. Figures are periodically revised — treat them as dated, sourced statistics, not evergreen facts.
| Indicator | Value | Unit | Year |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agricultural land | 29.13 | % of land area | 2023 |
| Arable land | 9.4 | % of land area | 2023 |
| Cereal yield | 5,828.8 | kg per hectare | 2023 |
| Cereal production | 73,966,646 | metric tons | 2023 |
| Crop production index | 111.41 | index (2014–2016 = 100) | 2022 |
| Food production index | 117.14 | index (2014–2016 = 100) | 2022 |
| Agriculture value added | 12.61 | % of GDP | 2024 |
| Employment in agriculture(est.) | 27.96 | % of total employment | 2024 |
Source: World Bank Open Data (World Development Indicators) (opens in a new tab) · dataset version 2026-07-01 · retrieved 2026-07-12
Cereal yield over time
Show data table
| Year | kg per hectare |
|---|---|
| 2012 | 5,086.8 |
| 2013 | 5,087 |
| 2014 | 5,099.1 |
| 2015 | 5,313.8 |
| 2016 | 5,158.7 |
| 2017 | 5,138.4 |
| 2018 | 5,227.8 |
| 2019 | 5,351.2 |
| 2020 | 5,461.8 |
| 2021 | 5,695.7 |
| 2022 | 5,833.8 |
| 2023 | 5,828.8 |
Source: World Bank Open Data (World Development Indicators) (opens in a new tab) · dataset version 2026-07-01 · retrieved 2026-07-12
Derived indicator
Arable land as a share of agricultural land: 32.3 % of agricultural land (2023)
Derived value — formula arable-share-of-agricultural-land v1.0.0 (calc v1). Inputs: AG.LND.ARBL.ZS (9.4) ÷ AG.LND.AGRI.ZS (29.1). A derived ratio, not an observed statistic. Sensitive to rounding and to differing revision cycles of the two source series; omit rather than extrapolate when a common year is unavailable.
Documented crops & livestock
Agricultural institutions
- Ministry of Agriculture (Kementerian Pertanian) — Central government ministry responsible for agricultural policy, extension, and food-crop programs.
- National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN) — National science agency that absorbed the former Indonesian Agency for Agricultural Research and Development (IAARD) and now hosts its agricultural research.
Data coverage & limitations
Covered by the World Bank WDI snapshots for land, production, yield, economy, inputs, and environment indicators.
- Statistics are dated, versioned, and periodically revised; single-year figures should not be read as a fixed baseline.
- National definitions of agricultural land, holdings, and commodities differ from those used by other countries, limiting direct comparison.
- National aggregates mask large differences between smallholder and estate production and between islands.
- Oil-palm expansion is intertwined with land-use and deforestation debates that area statistics alone do not convey.
Sources
This article draws on the following authoritative sources. See our sources & methodology for how they are selected.
- Authoritative
Cited for: Agricultural statistics (WDI)
- Type:
- Intergovernmental organization
- Jurisdiction:
- Global
- Accessed:
- 2026-07-12
- [2]FAO — Food and Agriculture Organization (opens in a new tab)Authoritative
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
Cited for: Production, land-use, and commodity context
- Type:
- Intergovernmental organization
- Jurisdiction:
- Global
- Accessed:
- 2026-07-12