22/04/2010 (All Africa) - Two projects piloted by the Ministries of Scientific Research and Innovation and that of Industries, Mines and Technological Development seek to modernise activities.

Afull-scale government action is on course to modernise oil palm production in the country with the purpose of maximising productivity and ensuring sufficiency both for family and industrial consumption. The Ministries of Scientific Research and Innovation and that of Industries, Mines and Technological Development have two giant projects, which upon completion, should move oil palm from the now rudimentary production, mostly at family scale, to a modern level.

The project in the Ministry of Industries, Mines and Technological Development, code-named, "project for improving the income generating potentials of the palm oil sector in the West and Central African Regions, notably in Nigeria and Cameroon", seeks to use the Malaysian experience to curb oil palm deficit in the country estimated at 50, 000 tons annually. The 48-month FCFA 2.305.520.000 project, financed by the Common Fund for Commodities and executed by the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO), will support farmers and farming activities to attain high yields. According to the project's coordinator, Chief Mbi Oruh Michael, also Technical Adviser NO.1 in the Ministry of Industries, Mines and Technological Development, the project consists in ensuring technology transfer so as to improve on existing oil processing units and helping farmers to increase their supply capacity, by giving them fertilisers and teaching them good agronomic techniques so that they can be able to improve their rfarm yields. It also targets improving on the quality and quantity of oil they produce so that it can ably stand competition in the international market.

In the Ministry of Scientific Research and Innovation, there is a project to provide farmers with improved, disease-resistant and high-yielding oil palm seedlings at reduced cost. The five year programme, hosted by IRAD, Dizangue, Dibamba of the Littoral Region, seeks to produce over 15 million improved oil palm seedlings that would be given to farmers at FCFA 200 per seedling, down from FCFA 235. With FCFA 3 billion, the project is expected to supply farmers with seeds that can improve national production of oil palm which is estimated at 200,000 tons annually. If the projects are properly executed and the timeframes respected to the letter, oil palm production in the country should hit the skies in the years ahead.