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The government has been criticized for its lack of successful action in tackling diseases that have ravaged cocoa crops for years.

Siswono Yudo Husodo, chairman of the Association of Indonesian Farmers (HKTI), the country’s leading farmers group, said on Tuesday the government had failed to take comprehensive action to eradicate diseases such as cocoa pod borer and vascular streak dieback.

“The government has never taken serious action to eradicate plantation diseases,” he said. “They never eradicate them completely, but only partially.”

Siswono said the diseases should have been controlled when they first appeared but they had not been and now were widespread.

For example, cocoa pod borer had first appeared in Central Sulawesi in 1987, he said.

“But there was no action to prevent it spreading and it had now become widespread,” he said.

Cocoa output has dropped in recent years, mainly due to diseases and aging trees.

In 2007, Indonesia produced about 520,000 tons of cocoa beans. This fell to 500,000 tons in 2008 and is expected to have fallen further to 480,000 tons in 2009, the Indonesian Cocoa Association (Askindo) said.

“Eradicating cocoa diseases needs to be done comprehensively at the same time,” Siswono said, adding that it was now being done in stages. “If we do it stage by stage, the infected plants will spread the disease to other healthy plants.”

Last year, the government launched a three-year program to revitalize cocoa plantations, including curbing disease and cutting down aging trees. The Agriculture Ministry allocated Rp 1 trillion ($107 million) for the program in 2009 and has allocated the same amount this year.

Achmad Mangga Barani, the ministry’s director general of plantations, has said the revitalization program was being implemented in stages because of its limited budget.

Average cocoa production is now only 0.5 tons a hectare. Under ideal conditions, it should be between 1.2 tons and 1.5 tons per hectare.

Indonesia is the world’s third-biggest cocoa producer, after Ivory Coast and Ghana, and has about 967,000 hectares of cocoa plantations.