Essential oils & personal care
Indonesian agarwood
Agarwood, known locally as gaharu, is the resinous heartwood produced by Aquilaria and Gyrinops trees. Every species in both genera is listed in CITES Appendix II, so any export needs a permit. Indonesia sets annual harvest and export quotas on top of that.
How it leaves the country.
- Wood and chips
- Graded by resin content and appearance under trade conventions that vary by region and by buyer.
- Oud oil
- Distilled from the resinous wood. Still a CITES-listed derivative, and the permit question does not go away because the form changed.
- Cultivated or wild
- Plantation-grown and inoculated material sits differently from wild-harvested wood, and the documentation follows which one it is.2
How it is graded.
Grade matters far less than legality on this product. Establish whether a lawful export can be made for the material you want before spending time on quality, because the answer is often no.
- CITES listing
- All Aquilaria and Gyrinops species were listed in Appendix II in 2005, on a proposal Indonesia itself made. Exporting countries must issue permits and report volumes.1
- Quotas
- Indonesia sets annual harvest and export quotas, allocated through regional forest offices to registered traders.2
- What an exporter needs
- A CITES export permit, a recommendation from the provincial conservation authority, forestry legality documents, and quota available to them.2
How it is packed.
- Documentation travels with it
- A CITES permit accompanies the consignment and is checked on both sides. A shipment that arrives without one is seized rather than delayed.
- Handling
- High value by weight, so packing is a security question as much as a protection one.
Where it grows.
Kalimantan
Borneo
Natural range for several of the listed species, and a long history of wild collection.
Sumatra
Sumatra
Both wild range and a growing base of cultivated, inoculated plantations.
Papua
Papua
Range for Gyrinops species, with the same permit and quota framework applying.
Who buys this.
Documentation, where applicable.
- CITES export permit
- Issued by the Indonesian management authority against available quota. Without it there is no lawful export, in any form of the product.1
- Conservation authority recommendation
- From the provincial conservation office, establishing that the material and the trader are within the system.2
- Import permit or notification
- Your own country's CITES authority has its own requirement on entry. Arrange it before the goods move rather than after.
- Certificate of origin
- Which form applies depends on the destination and on the preference scheme in force between it and Indonesia.
Questions buyers ask.
Can you source agarwood for me?
Only through a trader holding quota and only with a CITES permit, and often the honest answer is that the material you want cannot be exported lawfully this year. That is a better answer than a shipment that gets seized at your border.
Does the oil count as CITES material?
Derivatives of listed species carry the listing with them. Distilling the wood does not remove the requirement, and a supplier who says otherwise is describing a shipment that will be stopped.
Is plantation agarwood treated differently?
Cultivated material sits differently from wild-harvested wood in the system, and it still moves under permit. Establish which one you are being offered and how it is documented, because the distinction is the whole basis of the paperwork.
What does your service cost?
Five per cent of the order value, paid by you and never by the factory. A factory audit starts at $250 depending on location. We work with orders from $10,000 per shipment.
Tell us what you need.
Give us the specification and the destination port. We come back with producer options and an indicative price. Our fee is 5 % of the order value, paid by you and never by the factory.
Sources
- 1Review of the agarwood-producing genera Aquilaria and Gyrinops. CITES. Checked 3 August 2026.
- 2Non-detriment finding for agarwood in Indonesia. CITES. Checked 3 August 2026.