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Story by PAUL SINGE
IT is pineapple season in Eastern Highlands and the Goroka main market is flooded with the fruit.
Most of the pineapples sold there are transported from Bena, several kilometres from Goroka town.
Two of the regular sellers are Tate Amaile and his wife, Luisa Tate, from Oiafauyufa village in the lower Bena district.
The parents of three children started to farm pineapples after realising that two of their children had reached high school and were achieving great academic results. 
Amaile said they were from a remote part of the province and their main cash crops were coffee and pineapples.
“Since coffee is a seasonal crop, most people in lower Benna grow pineapples to cater for their children’s school fees and for daily basic needs and wants,” Amaile said. 
He said his family started pineapple farming in 2006.
Amaile said from the sale of pineapple, “we have sufficient capital to cater for my children’s education”.
He said their eldest son would be doing first year at the PNG University of Technology in Lae, Morobe.
The child would be in Grade 11 at the Good Shepherd Secondary School in Madang, while the youngest would be doing Grade 8 at home.
Amile said they usually took home K150 to K200 a day from the sales.