System to repair industry

THE block holder or smallholder system is a pathway to revive Papua New Guinea’s struggling rubber industry, Agriculture and Livestock Minister John Simon says.
Simon made the statement during a recent visit to Bisianumu Station in Sogeri, Central, where the once-thriving Bisianumu rubber plantation is located.
Bisianumu was once the country’s leading rubber producing plantation, producing up to K10,000 worth of rubber in a week.
Simon was accompanied by the PNG Rubber Board chairman Josephine Kenni and chief executive Andy Agovaua to Sogeri last week to see status of the plantation and identify strategies to commence work on reviving it.
The block holder and smallholder system when established, would see single families and or farmers supported through ownership of blocks or each hectare they would farm.
This system would see the farmers be solely responsible for their plots.
“It is imperative that this system is initiated in the rubber industry especially in this plantation and will do away with hiring of labourers,” Simon said.