Revive Angoram coffee industry, says chairman

ANGORAM Smallholder Coffee Growers Association chairman Thomas Ainero has urged farmers to revive coffee production and marketing in Angoram district as the crop had a well established market globally.
The association will soon set up a nursery pit in the district to supply young coffee trees with a higher yielding capacity and bigger seeds to farmers.
Ainero said he had secured funding from AusAID to buy building materials to build the pit nursery and grow the Omuru coffee variety because it could be propagated through cuttings and had good varieties.
He said coffee was grown widely in all the five LLGs of Angoram district, East Sepik, in the past but most plots were now covered in overgrown bushes because of the lack of extension services.
Ainero said he wanted to revive its production and marketing in the district because coffee had a well established market all over the world.
He said the association was slow in carrying out its work because funding earmarked and released by the office of the Regional Member for East Sepik, Sir Michael Somare, had been blocked by the district administration.
He urged people in the district to grow coffee apart from cocoa and other cash crops “because all cash crops have their turn in going through lower prices”.