Food productive plan needed

FOOD and nutrition security is a critical challenge for every nation around the world.
There are many efforts to drive dialogue and collaborative action at the global, regional and national levels.
World Food Day is forerunner of these actions.
This year’s theme focuses on addressing global hunger through healthy diets.
As a leading agricultural institution in the country, the National Agricultural Research Institute (Nari) is committed to doing its part to contribute to these efforts.
It does this mainly through the development, release and promotion of improved crop and livestock technologies.
To date, over 30 improved farming innovations have been released to enhance the nutritional and market value of smallholder sector fresh crop and livestock products.
To encourage wider adoption, initial discussions are being had on the possibility of establishing a national fresh food marketing chain.
In his reflection on the World Food Day; Dr Bang, the Nari director-general said that an effective national food marketing chain (NFPMC) could play a key role in providing a reliable supply of local produce to the growing population.
This will give confidence to our farmers to consistently supply and earn weekly income from the sale of fresh produce.
Through such a food chain, produce from Highlands and coastal provinces can be traded across respective regions.
This would give people access to a wide range of foods that can greatly improve the health of their diets.
Fresh produce from Highlands like sweet potato, cabbage and broccoli can be freighted to the coast and back-loaded with mango, taro and fish.
An NFPMC has the potential to improve overall national food security by driving economic empowerment among rural farming communities through gainful employment of the youth and women folk and promote sustainable development.
According to Fresh Produce Development Agency, the fresh produce industry has an annual net worth of over K2 billion.
The Port Moresby market demand is estimated at 140,000 tonnes/annum valued at K420 million.
Hunger is both an issue of access to sufficient quantity and quality of food resources.
Quality food production for both household consumption and sale is a feature of Nari’s work.
Much of this has been realised through the development of improved varieties of staple crops.
Examples include high yielding taro hybrids; sweet potatoes with high carotene content; and high yielding cassava varieties that are low in cyanide.
These innovations have helped not only in increased production, but also to improve food security during recent extreme droughts.
The work of developing new improved crops varieties is very much founded on Nari’s commitment to setting-up and maintaining crop and plant collection nurseries at its research stations around the country.
Currently, there are six national genetic resource collections. Examples of these include collections of lowland sweet potato is at Keravat, East New Britain; highland sweet potato collection at Aiyura, Eastern Highlands; taro collection is at Bubia, Morobe; and collections of yam, banana, aibika and cassava at Laloki, Central.
Every year, these technologies are showcased and promoted through the Institute’s Agricultural Innovation Show.
The show is the flagship calendar event which gauges the participation of all of Nari’s five regional research centres for information sharing and knowledge exchange with our stakeholders.
The last three years have featured new lines of high yielding, disease tolerant varieties of sweet potato and taro.
Dr Sergie Bang said that even though Nari released technologies are benefiting smallholder farmers in terms of improved nutrition and socio-economic wellbeing; lack of market accessibility can discourage farmers and make it difficult for them to adopt and put those innovations into practice.
The PNG population is growing at three per cent per annum but the rate of food production is only increasing at a mere one per cent.
This rate of food production is unlikely to feed the growing population, especially urban population that is highly dependent on imported food.
Creating a national fresh produce marketing chain will also make agriculture attractive to young people by providing an opportunity for over 60,000 school leavers to engage in farming activities, every year.
The fresh produce marketing chain should evolve around cool room depots in our provincial centres where the circulation of chillier containers will help to move produce over land and sea.
This is a cost-effective option of moving fresh produce from the highlands to all major urban markets in the coastal areas and likewise in return.
A recent study identified that there is a need to establish cooler depots at Mt Hagen, Goroka, Kundiawa, Bulolo, Lae, Port Moresby and Kokopo.
Port Moresby and Lae remain the biggest urban markets.
The concept should follow the private–public partnership model where the public sector provides the cool-chain infrastructure and the private sector, including local SMEs, uses it to do business.
A well-established fresh produce marketing chain will have great advantage in promoting regional trade, and strengthen the participation of smallholder farmer where women groups, youths and families can benefit directly.