Plans to drive agriculture in response to coronavirus

EAST New Britain (ENB) has big plans to sustain its economy and people through agriculture in response to the coronavirus pandemic, says a provincial agricultural officer.
ENB Kokonas Industri Korporesen (KIK) programme manager Ephraim Tade told The National during a site visit to Eden Sanctuary at Tobera, Kokopo, recently that under the province’s state of emergency (SOE) economic plan, there was a strategy underway known as the Covid-19 food security response operation.
Tade said Kokopo was the first district in ENB where its planting materials multiplication and distribution centre land clearance was in progress at Tobera plantation in Kokopo.
“This is in collaboration with KIK introducing the coconut base integrated farming system (CBIFS), meaning planting coconut and other food crops under and between the coconuts together on a piece of land but with big spacing,” he said.
Tade said Kokopo together with KIK had partnered with Eden Sanctuary, a locally-owned agriculture business enterprise in Tobera, for the vegetables and coconut seedlings supply for the palm-plus-palm system to distribute to farmers in the area and also the province.
He said their plan was to venture into CBIFS was timely as the provincial government is calling for sectors, especially agriculture, to formulate a plan that could be implemented during the state of emergency.
He said the sectors chose the system because of land issues and movement restrictions during the SOE – allowing people to stay on their land and work on it.