Aswandi and Cut Rizlani K, Keeping the Aroma of Toba Frankincens

ICHWAN SUSANTO

· 6 minutes read

For hundreds of years, kemenyan (frankincense) from Toba, North Sumatra, has been exported to a number of countries. Ironically, the trade in incense does not provide meaningful welfare to the farmers. Husband and wife Aswandi and Cut Rizlani Kholibrina, who research kemenyan, tried to develop it into perfume ingredients. They believed this would provide welfare to the farmers.

In 2011, Aswandi and Cut Rizlani — researchers from the Environment and Forestry Research and Development Agency (BP2LHK) Aek Nauli in Simalungun, Sumatra — explored kemenyan in villages around Lake Toba. In accordance with their knowledge in the field of silviculture, their mission was to look for superior kemenyan trees.

Instead of finding superior kemenyan trees, they found a big problem. The trees in the villages were very old so their productivity had declined. At the people-owned plantation, one tree produced 0.5 to 1 kilogram of sap every year. In fact, based on the latest investigation, the researchers suspected that there was a new type of kemenyan plant that could produce 2 kg of sap each year (Kompas, June 16, 2017).

"We initially wanted to find a solution to encourage the community to plant [kemenyan] again provided that the plants were superior, had good genetic quality and high productivity," said Aswandi, Thursday, May 2, in Parapat, Simalungun, North Sumatra.

They then interviewed farmers and asked them to show the kemenyan tree (Styrax sumatrana) that produced the most sap. From there, Aswandi and Cut Rizlani chose the type S sumatrana rather than the species of kemenyan durame (S benzoin Dryand) that also grows in North Sumatra. S sumatrana trees are known to produce better quality sap.

The plants were then collected to be cultivated until 2015 by local researchers in the Special Purpose Area of Aek Nauli Forest (KHDTK).

When they interacted with the farmers, they also found the price of kemenyan was very volatile. Sometimes 1 kilogram of kemenyan was only valued at Rp 200,000, sometimes it could go up to Rp 400,000. This phenomenon made Aswandi wonder, because the price of the commodity on the international market was relatively stable.

In addition, 1 liter of incense essential oil can reach a price of Rp 7 million. In fact, the cost of making 1 liter of incense essential oil is "only" around Rp 1 million for the purchase of raw materials and the production costs. That is if it is done on a laboratory scale.

More surprisingly, the farmers and local administration officials generally were unfamiliar with the final product of incense resin. They knew that poor quality incense resin could only be processed into incense, but they did not know what good quality incense resin could be used for.

Due to the farmer’s lack of knowledge about frankincense and the fluctuating prices, farmers do not get the maximum benefit from the incense plants. Farmers became increasingly unwilling to cultivate kemenyan so that the number of plants decreased in North Sumatra. Data on the area shows kemenyan forests shrunk from 21,119 ha in 1990 to 16,359 ha in 2008 in North Tapanuli. The regency has the largest area of kemenyan forest in North Sumatra.

The kemenyan forests on the people-owned plantations have been transformed into coffee and oil palm plantations. Since 2010, the indigenous kemenyan forest in Humbang Haundutan has been threatened by industrial plantations.

Citing Statistics Indonesia (BPS) North Sumatra data, in 2008 the production of kemenyan totaled 6,060 tons per hectare, decreasing to 4,620 tons per ha (2012). In order for the plants, which also have ecological functions as regulators of the water system, to be sustained, farmers need to be encouraged to replant their old plants instead of replacing them with other crops.

Frankincense perfume

Internationally, most research about Kemenyan has been done in India and Israel. "We learned a lot about incense in relation to medication and perfume," said Aswandi.

Two years ago, he met with the largest perfume industry based in Switzerland. From this meeting, he assured his wife, Cut Rizlani, to focus on incense. They also began to think about how to increase the added value of frankincense by purifying the sap. Starting from refining resin waste, such as incense bark, Aswandi and Cut Rizlani began producing essential oils for incense. This oil was fragrant and soft with a refreshing and soothing effect.

Only armed with her passion for perfume, Cut Rizlani, who actually has knowledge in silviculture and genetic code, then learned to make perfume from scratch. In short, she made frankincense oil as a base-note or the basis for making perfumes mixed with essential oils from other tropical forest plants.

The initial perfume they produced was made from mixing kemenyan oil with eucalyptus oil. The aroma that was produced resembles telon oil. They now have seven variants of homemade perfumes, produced by relying only on the sense of smell rather than the computerized methods used by major perfume companies.

The seven variants are Rizla (fresh floral), Riedh@ (floral fruit), Jeumpa (cempaka), Azwa (wood), Aphis (green oceanic), Tiara (oriental), and Sylva (forest). Each name is unique, like Azwa and Rizla, namely coming from the names Aswandi and Cut Rizlani. Riedh@ is the name

of another colleague. Tiara is a short name from Pratiara, head of BP2LHK Aek Nauli. Sylva comes from the name of Sylvana Rasina, secretary of the Research and Development Agency of KLHK.

Kemenyan perfume produced under the Tobarium brand has become a superior product of the Science and Technology Center for the Development of Highland Tropical Forest Management. Even more exciting, the innovative product will be showcased at Indonesia Innovation Day (IID) in Germany in June 2019.

Aswandi and Cut Rizlani hope that perfume made from forests belonging to local communities will develop into a national or international scale perfume industry. They will be very happy if the perfume industry provides welfare to poor farmers.

Cut Rizlani Kholibrina

Born: Tapak Tuan, Aug. 30, 1979

Education: Forest Management, IPB (graduated in 2002), Master in Forest Science, IPB (graduated in 2005)

Aswandi

Born: Kuok, Jan. 4, 1977

Education: Forestry, IPB (graduated in 2000), Master in Forestry, IPB (graduated in 2005), Doctor in Forestry, UGM (graduated in 2016)

Children: Attaqwa Laksamana Rizas (14), Agram Shairazy Rizas (10)

Editor:

kompascetak