Agriculture Minister Lopao‘o Natanielu Mu‘a said the species -originating in Israel- had been selected as the best for the export market. He said the first shipment grown in Samoa is expected to head to New Zealand by September.
The minister said farmers were being warned to look after their banana crops carefully, as these had to be pest and disease free in order to qualify for export. This is one of the reasons for the Ministry working closely with the country‘s larger commercial farmers.
Banana growing is cost and labour intensive and zeelandpress.com reports on how an agreement has been reached with these farmers to provide smaller scale farmers with planting suckers at no cost.
