PNGSDP funds potato project

 A 12-MONTH potato farming project funded by the PNG Sustainable Development Program Ltd has been opened in the Lower Wage LLG area of Margarima in Hela. 

The 1,000 people of the Kapendaga community live in a remote and mountainous area of the Komo-Margarima district, a two-hour drive from Tari. 

In the 1980s, the five ethnic clans of Kapendaga were tribal enemies. But because of the deteriorating living standards, the late 1990s saw community leaders opting to put their differences aside and established the Kapendaga Rangers Co-operative Society.

PNGSDP chief executive officer David Sode said such  changes were important for a community.

“We supported the proposal from the Catholic diocese of Mendi when we saw the tremendous effort the Kapendaga people were committing to changing their negative past and focussing on achieving a better standard of living,” he said.

“The Kapendaga Potato Farm Project is an initiative of the people carried out from start to finish. 

“And I am positive that they are going to achieve many more projects in future.”

The potato farm concept was chosen because the Kapendaga youths had already acquired skills in potato farming from previous work at the Kelta Potato farm in Mt Hagen. 

The society is using the K22,527 from PNGSDP to buy  74 bags of potato seedlings, fertilisers and insecticides. Each clan was given 14 bags of potato seedlings.