PM urges Siassi islanders to engage in farming, fisheries

PRIME Minister James Marape has urged people of the remote Siassi islands of Morobe to go into agriculture, forestry and fisheries.
He made the call when addressing councillors from the Siassi islands and Tewai-Siassi development authority (DDA) members, during a breakfast meeting in Port Moresby yesterday.
Marape also announced that he would visit Siassi later this year.
He said his Pangu Pati-led Government was working to ensure people had money.
“Our citizens must have money in their pockets,” he said.
“What is political independence if people in the villages don’t have money?
“The easiest way to put money into the pockets of our people is for them to go into agriculture, forestry and fisheries.” The councillors and the DDA members were brought to Port Moresby by MP Dr Kobby Bomareo to discuss various issues concerning the islands.
Marape urged the people of Siassi to go into cocoa, copra and coffee growing as well as developing their forestry and fisheries resources to empower themselves financially and bring about economic development.
He said the cocoa industry needed to be revived in Siassi.
Marape said even though copra production had stopped, coconuts were still a commodity in demand on the global market and was worth farming.
He assured those with coconut plantations that his government would buy their produce.