Click on image for article page
Commercial agriculture has a growing potential and Grace Road Food Company is tapping into this.
The Korean church-based company says it will be investing $5 million towards an Agricultural Training Institute in Navua.
The construction is expected to begin in January and is expected to be completed by October 2016.
Company managing director Daniel Kim said: “The students need actual farming skills and they need the proper venue to learn this skill.
“This institute will provide this platform for the students and bring out the potential in them.”
The institute is proposed to offer both practical and theory agriculture work for the students.
The three strategies the institute will concentrate on are organic farming, mechanised farming and value adding.
Partnership
Mr Kim said in order to take this project forward they need support and partnership.
“To operate this institute we need people support, we need interest, we need Government involvement, we need university involvement and we need community farmer’s involvement to operate this institute.”
The company did a presentation yesterday for the Fiji National University on the establishment of the institute.
The presentation highlighted the need for partnership to help the institute to operate and be sustainable.
Chancellor Ikbal Jannif said the university will look into the proposal and deliberate to finalise an answer.
Potential
“There is a lot of potential in commercial farming but the issue is selling of the products. There aren’t sufficient markets to sell the products,” Mr Kim explained.
“In order to break down this situation we need to go with organic farming, mechanised farming and value adding.
“We will train the studies at the Institute so they understand the potential that lies in the agriculture sector.”