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Business |
Cocoa production declines in Ramu
By JEFFREY ELAPA
COCOA production in the Middle Ramu electorate in Madang province
is declining due to high transportation cost.
George Buri, one of the first cocoa growers in the Aiome district,
told The National that most cocoa growers had been forced to cease
all cocoa production because they were not making any profits.
He said most of the money they receive after the sales of cocoa
went to transport leaving them with nothing.
He said this practice had forced the growers from taking interest
in producing cocoa because it was not viable to generate
sufficient income.
Mr Buri said that transporting the products by air cost a grower
about K80 per bag while hiring dugout canoes to transport by water
cost more than K300, which was an unreliable exercise depending on
the weather.
He said sometimes heavy rain destroyed their cocoa beans, and when
sold they earn less than what they expected to get.
He said it took about a week to finally reach Madang to sell their
cocoa at the depots.
“We sometimes have to wait for days, if there are no vehicles, to
transport our cocoa bags to town from Bundi or Base Camp.”
Mr Buri said lack of road access to the area was the biggest
huddle for the people and for all other developments to take place
in the area.
He said successive leaders had never considered building a road
link to the area to help improve the living standards of the
people.
He said he started planting cocoa in 1980 and set up his own
fermentary in 1990 but he had never made any profit from all his
hard work.
Mr Buri said he used his own initiative to assist people in his
area to grow cocoa and ordered 55,000 hybrid cocoa seeds from
Keravat to distribute to interested growers.
“However, this interest is diminishing because people realise that
there are no positive returns from their hard work.”
He said the Middle Ramu district produced disease free and organic
cocoa seeds but the huge transport cost incurred was the biggest
single burden for not actively participating in cocoa production.
 
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