Potato farmers in Southern Highlands undergo training

Business

THE Southern Highlands division of agriculture and livestock rolled out the first phase of training for potato farmers at Poroma station in Nipa-Kutubu on Tuesday.
The training ends today (Thursday).
Man potato farmers from around the district turned up for the training but were turned away due to the Covid-19 measures in place.
Only 250 were selected for the training.
DAL adviser Kenneth Kuim said a team from the Fresh Produce Development Agency (FPDA) supported DAL to conduct the training after a memorandum of understanding was signed last year.
“It is because of the Covid-19 and we (DAL and FPDA) have started off with the 250 farmers,” he said.
“We will slowly train them all before moving into other districts.
“The training is in two parts, theory and field demonstration.
“Field demonstration is important because many farmers have huge hectares of land but lack the knowledge on how to apply fertilisers, spacing, use of insecticides and others.”
Kuim said the potato factory in Pangia required 40-80 tonnes of potatoes each day.
“Currently, the factory buys potatoes from Enga, Western Highlands and Jiwaka who are the major suppliers,” he said.
“The potato project is an initiative of the provincial government under the leadership of Governor William Powi in partnership with Israeli’s Agro Industry and the people in the province must supply majority of the produce and benefit from it.”
Kuim said the provincial government recently appropriated K10 million to support the potato project and most of the funding would be used to subsidise the potato price.
Powi said while PNG was impacted by the Covid-19 which was slowing economic activity, alternative economic initiatives needed to be provided to the people to stimulate economic activities in the provinces, districts and communities.
“To other farmers involved in other agricultural activities, the provincial government will also be giving support to them,” he said.

One thought on “Potato farmers in Southern Highlands undergo training

  • This is a bias project, its all happening in the Governors home district in Nipa. The funding from the provincial government is not distributed fairly across the province.

    Governor and his cohorts must not brag on the project, have seen no significant impact in this space.

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