Galip Nut Nursery Project in Morobe launched

The Morobe Division of Agriculture and Livestock is aiming to boost Morobe’s economic growth for the next couple of years with successful Galip nut growth and hope to build a Galip Factory to do downstream processing and distribute locally and internationally.

The Division of Agriculture and Livestock for Morobe confirmed this after launching the Galip nut Nursery Project at Wawin Farm and Resource Center last week.

From the record, the total seeds sowed was 12,444 which had been brought from Kerevat and germinated a total seed of 10,485.

Morobe Provincial Program Advisor for Division of Agriculture and Livestock, Ken Elonaga said after 20 years of research done by the National Agriculture Research Institute (NARI), the Galip nut was chosen as one of the vital nuts to be planted as a cash crop.

"Morobe has huge potential to go into diversification and integrated farming, due to the favorable conditions that the Coastal Areas of Morobe has," he added.

He went on saying that the seedlings were distributed to seven districts of Morobe Province, which includes Nawaeb, Lae, Huon Gulf, Bulolo, Markham, Finschaffen, and Tewae Siassi, specifically to the areas that are good and able for the trees to grow.

In his speech, Deputy Director for Forest Resource Institute, Nalish Sam mentioned that there are 26 species of Galip nut that are found in Papua New Guinea.

"The Galip nut has many benefits as it is used as a cure for certain health problems and also used traditionally by some cultures of PNG." He said.

Interested farmers representing each district of Morobe Province were asked to take 20 seedlings each for planting in their chosen areas of planting.