PT Petrokimia Gresik (Persero), an Agroindustrial Solutions company and member of the PT Pupuk Indonesia (Persero) holding, brought Indonesia's industrial transformation and sustainable agriculture experience to a global forum in New York, United States. The presence of Petrokimia Gresik represents a continuation of the company's sustainability innovation accomplishments, including GladiAgro: Next-Gen Soil Revival, a soil health recovery solution that previously won the highest award in the SDGs Innovation Accelerator for Young Professionals 2026.
The President Director of Petrokimia Gresik, Daconi Khotob, on Sunday (20/9) local time or Monday (21/9) Indonesian time, attended the 2026 UN Private Sector Forum at the United Nations (UN) Headquarters in New York. The invitation-only forum brought together approximately 150 senior leaders from business, government, and the UN to discuss accelerating the transition toward clean, fair, and secure energy. In this forum, Daconi was the sole president director from Indonesia who had the opportunity to attend.
The forum was organized by the UN Global Compact led by Sanda Ojiambo, Assistant Secretary-General of the UN as well as CEO and Executive Director of the UN Global Compact, and was attended by UN Secretary-General António Guterres. The forum agenda addressed various challenges of the global energy transition, ranging from investment, infrastructure, and policy to collaboration between governments and the business sector to accelerate the implementation of clean energy.
On Monday (21/9) local time or Tuesday (22/9) Indonesian time, Daconi was once again a speaker at the Global Talent for Sustainable Development forum held at the Consulate General of the Republic of Indonesia (KJRI) in New York. In the forum that brought together the Indonesian diaspora, students, business leaders, sustainability practitioners, and innovators, Daconi emphasized the importance of Indonesian talent readiness in facing the growth of green jobs and the transformation of green industry.
“The transformation toward a green economy is fundamentally also a transformation of the workforce. Investment in technology must walk hand in hand with investment in human resources. Green technology will only provide benefits if supported by talents capable of designing, operating, and developing it,” said Daconi.
Daconi also encouraged Indonesian talents in New York to take part in this transformation by bringing global knowledge, experience, and networks to contribute to Indonesia's progress. According to him, the need for human resources with global competence will become increasingly vital alongside the growth of green industry and sustainable economy.
“We hope the best Indonesian talents who are currently studying or working abroad can bring back their knowledge and experience to contribute to Indonesia. Moving forward, the transformation requires human resources possessing competence, global perspective, and the ability to respond to industrial changes,” he added.
According to Daconi, Petrokimia Gresik holds a unique position as it sits on both sides of the transformation simultaneously. On the upstream side, the company is a fertilizer and chemical industry continuously improving efficiency and lowering carbon intensity. Meanwhile on the downstream side, its products and innovations directly touch upon farmer productivity, soil health, and the sustainability of Indonesian agriculture.
One such effort is through GladiAgro, developed to address the challenge of declining soil health. Based on Petrokimia Gresik's testing of 40,282 soil samples across 27 provinces since 2016, 91.9 percent exhibited low organic carbon content. In its implementation, GladiAgro utilizes Petro Gladiator as a superior microbe-based decomposer to accelerate the decomposition process of agricultural waste and organic matter into organic nutrients. These nutrients are subsequently returned to the land to increase organic matter content, improve soil structure, and support soil health recovery.
“Our green transformation does not stop at the factory gates, but continues all the way to agricultural land. In industry, we must make production processes increasingly efficient and low-carbon. In the agricultural sector, we must also help farmers maintain soil health, utilize inputs more precisely, and increase productivity sustainably,” he explained.
NEW COMPETENCIES FOR FUTURE INDUSTRY
In the forum at KJRI New York, Daconi brought the perspective of “Green Jobs: From Green Transformation to Green Talent”. According to him, the shift toward a low-carbon industry does not only alter technology and energy sources, but also workforce competencies.
Engineers and operators who previously focused heavily on reliability and production capacity, for instance, will going forward also need to understand energy efficiency, renewable energy, carbon management, and low-carbon technology. Talent requirements are also expanding broadly, ranging from engineering and environment to agriculture, digital, data, finance, and business.
“Engineers remain engineers, agronomists remain agronomists, and accountants remain accountants. But the technology they use, the competencies they require, and the metrics of their success will change. Therefore, talent strengthening must be carried out through reskilling, upskilling, industrial experience, as well as cross-disciplinary collaboration,” he explained.
This talent strengthening runs in parallel with Petrokimia Gresik's operational transformation. The company has a decarbonization roadmap toward Net Zero Emission (NZE) 2060. By 2030 as a short-term target, Petrokimia Gresik aims for a 30 percent emission reduction compared to the Business as Usual (BAU) scenario of 3.46 million tons CO₂e.
These efforts are carried out through energy and utility efficiency, the use of cleaner energy sources, utilization of renewable energy and CO₂, as well as the development of low-carbon technologies. One of these is the plan to develop green hydrogen to support (hybrid) green ammonia production with a capacity of 250 MTPD, which is currently being studied by Petrokimia Gresik together with Pupuk Indonesia as part of the company's energy transformation.
According to Daconi, these shifts mean that industry can no longer merely be a user of labor, but also needs to help shape future talent through competency development and collaboration with the government, universities, and various stakeholders.
“Indonesian green talent must be prepared starting now because the green industrial transformation will not wait for our readiness. Collaboration among industry, government, universities, as well as Indonesian talent both domestically and abroad will serve as an essential foundation so that this transformation does not only lower emissions, but also creates economic value, strengthens food security, and opens up opportunities for future generations,” Daconi concluded.
Attachments
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