Helping farmers from the ground up

ExxonMobil is helping empower Indonesian farmers in East Java.
We’re supporting them to cut costs, while growing their businesses and their yields.
Initiatives in the region include helping farmers produce organic fertilizers.

News

2 min read

• Sept. 19, 2025

Farming is one of the industries at the heart of Indonesia’s East Java region, and we’re empowering its farmers in as many ways as we can. From helping them grow their yields to supporting them to work more collaboratively, we’re backing farmers in the area.

Fungi and fertilizers

Sometimes it pays to go back to basics. ExxonMobil partnered with non-governmental organization (NGO) Yayasan Daun Bendera Nusantara to take rice farmers back to school, to help them better understand both their business and local environment.

Our joint education program’s first stages focused on improving farmers’ land management skills and reducing costs by utilizing local resources. The program, which ran across eight villages, taught farmers how to make organic fermented fertilizer instead of using expensive chemical fertilizers. This helped improve their soil and limited weed growth.

Organic pest control was next. Farmers learned how to grow a mushroom that is safe for humans and animals but dangerous for pests. After it was mixed with water and sprayed over the rice plants, the pests quickly died while beneficial bugs like spiders were spared.

This had a two-fold benefit for farmers. “Our harvests have become more abundant,” said the head of the local farmers’ association, Kasmiran. “By using this fungi, we can avoid the potential risk of chemicals to us and our plants,” he added. “We can also confidently say our crops are nearly organic.” Getting an organic status would allow farmers to charge a premium for the rice.

Thanks to this joint initiative farmers have seen a string of benefits. These includes better harvests, crops they might be able to sell as organic, and saving money by making their own fertilizers.

Building businesses

Another initiative in East Java includes collaborating with farmers and fishermen to help them look beyond the day-to-day and take their business to the next level.

Working with charity group Yayasan Bina Swadaya, we’ve helped farmers from 14 villages in the province work together as one.

The initiative allowed agriculture businesses in the area to specialize in things like livestock management, fishing, rice flour production and crop storage.

Villagers went on to form a collective representing the 14 villages. Together with our local NGO partners’, we support them to create a number of new businesses, including a catfish breeding business and a compost factory. They’ve also invested in equipment to process, mill and dry more rice, becoming a significant supplier of rice to our Banyu Urip operations. The collective includes businesses that specialize in crop storage, which means the villages can store crops themselves -helping them cut out the middleman.

From education to business skills, we’re supporting farmers from the ground up.