Buru Island, a paradise for cajuput oil (part 1)

Cajuput oil is inseparable from Indonesian society as a traditional medicine. This is unsurprising, as the cajuput tree grows natively in Indonesia, particularly in the eastern region. For the people of Buru Island in particular, cajuput oil is a blessing. The distillation of cajuput oil has been ongoing since the Dutch colonial era. In Buru Regency, there are 45,000 hectares of land covered with cajuput trees, but only 10 per cent of this land is currently productive. The local government plans to make cajuput oil one of Buru Island’s flagship products.