Denis Opudo
The agricultural sector has been the backbone of economic growth of both the underdeveloped and developing countries and Papua New Guinea (PNG) is not an exception. The use of human labor is slowly fading away and people are slowly incorporating the use of technology in getting the best during harvesting. The Department of Agriculture and Livestock of PNG in consultation with other key stakeholders came up with the FAQ a regional project on e-agriculture strategy development. The initiative aims at developing an E-Agriculture Strategy in PNG.
The strategy will assist in guiding stakeholders through a whole approach in making good use of great opportunities in ICT in the country’s agricultural and national growth. With an aim to counterattack the strategy, the government of PNG has forwarded a request to FAQ to give technical backing to the continued capacity development for harmonizing of the ICT solutions in agricultural growth. It also aimed at implementing of demonstration activities for the development of strategy and process of finalization.
People are having a lot of expectations for the project. The immediate one will be an enhanced capacity development of sustainable ICT solutions. This will be solutions that speed up the achievement of agricultural vision and goals. The TCP will attain the outcome through the use of two critical outputs. First, it will enforce high priority ICT in agricultural services and solutions, developed and put into practice. The second one will be building capacity at the provincial and national levels to create priority e-agriculture solutions. The second one will also help to locate, prioritize, develop, put into action and sustain ICT in agricultural solutions and services.
The project will help in backing the PNG National Medium-Term Priority Framework (NMTPF) for 2010 to 2014. It will specifically touch specific areas on that framework. It will work on strengthening capacity in the collection, management, and analysis of data. Moreover, it will work on strengthening policy, strategic and regulatory guidelines for sustainable agriculture, fisheries and forestry development. The project will also help to enhance the capacity for agricultural goods to be at per with the market standards and be competitive in key markets. Apart from pushing for efficient and sustainable fisheries practices and management, the project will help to foster sustainable forests and trees management.
