Dede Sophie

Prime Minister  James Marape has given his support to development of the oil palm industry in Papua New Guinea on a massive scale. PM Marape gave his support after he and East Sepik Governor,  Allan Bird, met with representatives of Pacific Elite Palm Oil Group in Singapore on Monday (November 21, 2022). The company currently runs an oil palm project in East Sepik, which it wants to emulate in all provinces, saying that it will be an economic gamechanger for the whole country. The company aims to create the largest agriculture-based wealth in the South Pacific, as well as generate electricity for PNG, using oil palm. Governor Bird told PM Marape that if a long-term oil palm development plan was drawn up, with the aim of economic independence for PNG, one million hectares of oil palm grown all over PNG would bring in an extra K100 billion for the country. “We can double our GDP just from palm oil,” he said. “If we go into downstream processing, this K100 billion could double, so that we...

Even in the cold depths of winter January has forced us from our heated blankets to do some  time-sensitive work in the garden. However if we don’t do it now we risk damaging the emerging bulbs planted last year as well as lose an opportunity to move some ill-placed plants while they are still dormant. We also made an Avatar tree! The opportunities where soil conditions are reasonable and its not too cold to work in are rare, so it makes sense to create a hierarchy of jobs that can be actioned quickly when conditions allow. Dipsite still technically being winter, walking around the local area we can see daffodils, snowdrops and a few crocus coming into bloom so you have to be really careful about not damaging the emerging bulbs when you are walking on what looks to be baron plant borders. If you would like to see more content like this then check out our YouTube channel ‘Walking Talking Gardener’. It is free to subscribe and you can unsubscribe whenever you like instan...