The Department of Agricultural and Rural Development (DARD) in Santo is supporting the establishment of tropical plantation with Tahitian limes.
The initiative also supports the expansion of planting more Tahitian limes with the use of a tractor for land preparation.
Tropical plantation was located on Santo Island and supplied most of its Tahitian limes to the supermarkets, resorts, and restaurants in Luganville town.
The farm has the potential and capacity to export its Tahitian limes to overseas markets under the national export programme of Tahitian limes as required by the national export pathway.
In 2023, the Department of Agriculture continued to assist potential farmers and farms to plant more Tahitian lime seedlings with technical training and standards for domestic market demand and export market.
DARD confirmed that in 2022, Vanuatu exported 4,564.6kg (5.03t) of Tahitian limes to the New Zealand market.
Financial assistance for the inititaive was provided by the Vanuatu government through the EDF11 support programme and the Vanuatu Biosecurity Services for the contributions.
Photo supplied Caption: Tahitian lime plantation at tropical plantation in Santo