Cocoa production rises after new farming concept introduced

By JUNIOR UKAHA
A NEW specialised farming concept introduced at the University of Natural Resources and Environment’s (UNRE) Vudal Farm has resulted in an increase in cocoa production.
The farm recently, for the first time since introduction of the method, produced 18 bags of dried cocoa beans.
The cocoa bags were sold to Agmark and fetched K7467 for the university.
“This was the result of good cocoa management and a new concept introduced by farm manager Alex Nugi,” farm information officer Willie Matthew said.
“Under this concept, each worker was assigned to concentrate on specific area of his job.
“The worker took responsibility for spraying, weeding and harvesting of cocoa pods.”
Matthew said the concept made people become specialised and put extra effort into their respective tasks.
He said the arrangement also made it easy to track down what each worker was doing and how resources allocated were used.
Matthew believes, with the method, production will continue to increase and produce a good result at the end of this year.
Previously, the farm, located in the Gazelle local-level government of East New Britain, was producing less bags of cocoa.
Nugi, since joining the university, had focused more on using available resources for new investment opportunities.
The farm management had maintained the cocoa dryer shed at a cost of K13,000, upgraded the size of the cocoa nursery which can now cater for 24,000 seedlings (supplying Productive Partnership in Agriculture Programme farmers), and rolling over from three to four months.
Matthew said previously the nursery catered for only 10,000 seedlings.
As a blanket approach, the farm management has embarked on specialised farming to allow each officer to concentrate on key tasks to see greater yields.