“…According to the Ministry of Primary Industries (MPI), as of December 2018, nearly 670,000 smallholders, accounting for nearly 40% or 2,280,805 ha of total oil palm planted areas, relied on the oil palm plantation for a living, while the remaining 60% or 3,568,525 ha were owned by private estates (Zakaria et al, 2020). In Malaysia, there are three main players that dominate palm oil industry including private companies, organised smallholders, and independent smallholders (Zakaria et al, 2020). As of December 2019, independent smallholders accounted for less than 17% of total planted oil palm and 260,353 farmers (Arshad et al, 2020), with most of the independent smallholders reside in Johor, Sarawak, and Sabah (Rahman, 2020).…”