I am a researcher at Sungei Putih Research Center, Indonesian Rubber Research Institute. My major research fields are agronomy, plant physiology, and latex harvesting system. Our aim is to establish the harvesting system that most suitable for the cultivation system here in Indonesia. Since our major users are state-owned companies, as well as private companies and smallholder farmers, our research programs are designed to be in line with the company’s goal and government program. We explore the clonal typology of rubber clones and specify the tapping system based on the latex metabolism i.e. high metabolism and medium and low metabolism tapping system. The distinction between them includes the panel usage and stimulant application monitored by periodic latex diagnosis. This approach optimizes the clonal yield potency and prevents over-exploitation. Our recommendation collaborates with global scientist works and our experiments result to overcome the local specific problems. The adjustments were carried out to address some issues such as population decline, skilled-tapper shortage, and low price conditions. Our proposed tapping system has been being well adopted in most of the state-owned companies for more than a decade and shows a promising yield increase.

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