Beneficiary Satisfaction with an Agroecology-Based Empowerment Program of a Hydropower Company in Asahan, Indonesia

This study aims to evaluate how satisfied the beneficiaries of RANUM ASAHAN (Ruang Agroekologi dan Nilai Unggul Masyarakat Asahan) are with the program, a community empowerment initiative of the hydropower plants of PT Indonesia Asahan Aluminium (Persero) in Aek Songsongan Village, Asahan Regency, by using the Community Satisfaction Index (Indeks Kepuasan Masyarakat, IKM) based on 19 items. The study employs a quantitative approach using an August 2026 interview survey of 38 beneficiaries. Rating counts were reconstructed from the published percentages and tested item by item against the satisfaction threshold (3.00) with Holm-adjusted t-tests and exact sign tests. The results indicate that all 19 items exceed the threshold (adjusted p ≤ 0.0002). The highest scores are found in environmental quality (3.74), method appropriateness (3.66), and company responsiveness (3.66), and thirteen items received no rating below satisfied. However, the lowest scores are observed in income gain and facilitator competence (both 3.39), and all nine less-satisfied ratings (1.2% of 722) fall on six items: relevance, skills, income, readiness to run the program without the company, and participation in planning and in monitoring. The reported total of 88.17 is “very satisfied” on the report’s scale and grade A under the 2004 guideline, but it lies 0.14 points under grade A of the 2017 guideline, and the difference is not statistically significant (p = 0.60). This study concludes that the beneficiaries are highly satisfied, with the environment, the method, and the company’s responsiveness as the main strengths and income and self-reliance as the main gaps. To improve the program, it is recommended to record production and income for each activity, to prepare a handover plan for each activity, and to state the interpretation scale and the confidence intervals in future surveys.