Essential oils & personal care
Indonesian patchouli oil
Patchouli oil is steam-distilled from the dried leaves of Pogostemon cablin. Buyers contract it on patchouli alcohol content, the fraction that carries the odour and the fixative power, so lots are quoted by a PA number instead of a grade letter. Aceh, Sumatran and Sulawesi oils differ in composition and in smell.
How it leaves the country.
- Crude oil
- Straight from the still: dark, heavy, and what most of the world's patchouli trades as.
- Redistilled
- Lighter in colour and cleaner in profile. It is a different product at a different price, and buyers who need one will not accept the other.
- Molecular distilled
- Fractionated to concentrate the alcohol, quoted at higher PA numbers, and bought for a specific job in a formulation.
How it is graded.
Patchouli is one of the few things Indonesia exports where an international standard does the defining. Contract against it and against a PA number, and very little is left to argue about later.
- Standard
- ISO 3757:2002, oil of patchouli (Pogostemon cablin (Blanco) Benth.)1
- Contracted on
- Patchouli alcohol content, quoted as a PA number, alongside colour, optical rotation and refractive index.
- Why the region is on the spec
- Acehnese, Sumatran and Sulawesi oils differ in composition and odour. A perfumer's brief is often written to one of them by name, and swapping in another is not a like-for-like substitution.
How it is packed.
- Containers
- Filled by net weight into lined drums. The lining matters more than it sounds: patchouli darkens on contact with bare metal, and a lot can arrive off-colour for that reason alone.
- Sampling
- Retain samples on both sides against the shipped batch. With an oil priced on a single analytical figure, a retained sample is the only way to settle a dispute later.
Where it grows.
Aceh
Sumatra
The longest-established patchouli region in the country, and the origin most often written into a perfumery specification by name.
North Sumatra
Sumatra
Smallholder cultivation and village-scale distillation feeding the same collectors as Aceh.
Sulawesi
Sulawesi
A separate producing region with its own composition and its own buyers. Oils from here and from Sumatra are not interchangeable.
Who buys this.
Origins with a protected name.
Names the trade contracts on, most of them on the Indonesian register of geographical indications.
Documentation, where applicable.
- Certificate of analysis
- Against ISO 3757 and the contracted PA number, issued on the batch that shipped and not on a reference sample.1
- Safety data sheet
- Required by everyone who handles the goods downstream, and the basis for how the drum is classified in transit.
- REACH
- For the EU, the registration obligation sits with the importer or an appointed only representative. It does not sit with the Indonesian distiller.2
- Certificate of origin
- Which form applies depends on the destination and on the preference scheme in force between it and Indonesia.
Questions buyers ask.
What does PA 30 or PA 38 mean?
The patchouli alcohol content of the oil as a percentage, measured by analysis. It is the figure the oil is priced on, so it belongs in the contract next to the ISO standard, and every shipment should carry a certificate of analysis for the batch that shipped.
Is Aceh oil better than Sulawesi oil?
Neither one is better. They differ in composition and in odour profile, and which one suits depends entirely on the formulation it is going into. A house that has built a fragrance on Acehnese oil will notice a substitution straight away.
Why is crude patchouli so dark?
Partly the material and partly the still. Contact with bare metal during distillation and storage darkens the oil, which is why lined containers and a redistillation step both change what arrives.
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
- 1ISO 3757:2002, oil of patchouli (Pogostemon cablin (Blanco) Benth.). International Organization for Standardization. Checked 3 August 2026.
- 2Entering the European market for essential oils. CBI, Netherlands Enterprise Agency. Checked 3 August 2026.