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Developing Integrated Systems for Biodiversity Monitoring
Main TrackSustainable AgrifoodMusim Mas
Up to S$20,000 in POC / pilot fundingUp to S$20,000 POC Development Grant
Musim Mas
is a fully integrated palm oil company with global operations across the entire value chain, enabling them to deliver high-quality products safely, efficiently and responsibly. Present in 13 countries, their main operations are in Indonesia, spanning from cultivation to refining and manufacturing.
As of December 2024, Musim Mas manages 29,189 hectares of conservation area, spread across Kalimantan and Sumatra. The company is committed to fulfilling their Sustainability Policy, that involves the protection, management and monitoring of their conservation areas in estates and where appropriate in the surrounding landscape. As a member of Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), Musim Mas also adheres to RSPO requirements to protect and enhance High Conservation Value (HCV) Areas and High Carbon Stock (HCS) Forests.
One of their management and monitoring efforts is wildlife monitoring, conducted bi-monthly. The wildlife monitoring activities are carried out in the designated monitoring plots located in each subsidiary company. They are currently monitoring over 200 monitoring plots across 14 plantations, with 14 to 17 location staff members as designated observers. Each observer is responsible for one site with multiple monitoring plots.
At present, observations of four focal taxa - birds, mammals, reptiles, and butterflies - are recorded manually on paper, transcribed into long-format Excel sheets, and accompanied by photos stored separately. Data is then consolidated monthly at headquarters.
This process is slow, fragmented, and error-prone. The Excel-based system hinders real-time insights. Musim Mas is therefore seeking a digital biodiversity monitoring system that is offline-capable and scalable, and allows centralised data management and analysis. The integrated system should allow Musim Mas to securely manage all the data within its own storage in a real-time manner. It is worth noting that their conservation is located in a rural area, hence the solution offered needs to consider the limitation on the internet connection.
How might we develop an integrated system for monitoring biodiversity (birds, mammals, reptiles, and butterflies)?
Requirements
Technical Requirements:
- Provide a field app that enables digital, paperless data capture.
- Support offline data entry with sync on reconnection (critical for rural areas).
- Store data in a centralised database (internal or external hosting acceptable).
- Allow upload of historical Excel data for multi-year time-series analysis.
- Include basic dashboards / BI tools to query by company, year, or all companies, and visualise 3 to 5-year trends.
- Devices must be rugged, long-battery-life tablets suitable for tropical field conditions (high temperatures and humidity).
Performance Requirements:
- Reduce data entry and reporting time (currently this takes weeks to consolidate).
- Improve data integrity and consistency across 14 sites.
- Enable comparative analysis across years and sites.
- Ability to scale from one pilot site (Riau) to 250 monitoring plots
Who Should Apply:
- Startups, SMEs, and solution providers with experience in digital biodiversity monitoring systems, AI / ML species ID, or conservation data platforms
- Must operate effectively with field staff in rural Indonesia.
Potential Sustainability Impact:
- Strengthened biodiversity monitoring across a total of 29,000ha of conservation land
- Faster, more reliable insights to track conservation performance
- A model for replication across the palm oil sector and broader agro-commodities or conservation organisations
POC / Pilot & Incentives
Expected POC / Pilot & Timeline:
- POC / pilot site: Riau (near headquarters, for ease of access and oversight)
- Q3 2026: Targeted completion of POC / pilot to allow possible rollout in 2027 if successful
- Minimum POC/pilot capabilities:
- Offline field data capture
- Sync to central database
- Upload of historical Excel data
- Scalable for improvement (for example, new species encountered)
- Compatible with a wide range of devices, i.e. smartphones, laptops, PCs, and tablets
POC / Pilot Funding:
- Musim Mas will provide milestone-based POC / pilot funding of up to S$20,000.
- Enterprise Singapore is augmenting this support with a POC development grant of up to S$20,000 for eligible startups / SMEs. Foreign startups / SMEs may be considered if developmental activities are based in Singapore and only if a Singapore office is incorporated. The POC Development grant could also be awarded to startups / SMEs incorporated in Singapore for projects with overseas pilot deployment potential.
POC / Pilot Support:
- Access to Musim Mas’ biodiversity monitoring methodology and existing Excel datasets
- Site access in Riau
- Support from biodiversity and field staff
Further Opportunities:
- If the POC is successful, the solution would be supported by a development and deployment budget of US$50,000 to 100,000.
- The solution should be designed for scalable deployment across approximately 40 monitoring sites within Musim Mas’ operations.
- If successful, the solution could also be applied more broadly across the palm oil industry, other agro-commodities, and conservation organisations.
Info Session
Check out the recording from our Info Session, where Lidl & Kaufland Asia shared more about their challenge statement.
RESOURCES
Info Session Recording
Revisit the detailed presentation on this challenge statement from our virtual Info Session.
Next Steps
Still have questions?
- Write to us at info@padang.co with any questions.
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