Over $18 million was distributed to more than 5000 farmers in rural and maritime communities by the Agricultural Marketing Authority (AMA) over the last five years.
This was revealed by AMA executive chairman Jone Sovalawa at the launch of AMA’s Strategic Development Plan (SDP) for 2024-2026.
“We encourage our farmers via our social medium platform to grow more of the highly demanded commodities,” he said.
He said AMA had faced a lot of teething problems when it was set up by Government 20 years but two key ones were governance issues and financial discipline which often related to the absence of documented plans and other management issues.
“For more than 10 years, there has not been any well-articulated plans for AMA.
“The new board was determined when it started 18 months ago to complete these two planning documents (corporate plan and SDP).
“This is to allow AMA to have clear direction as required by government and link it to key performance indicators.
“I am glad to say that AMA now has a corporate plan, a financial manual, corporate governance manual and now an SDP. It intends to complete its annual report by December 2024.” Mr Sovalawa said.
Minister for Agriculture and Waterways Vatimi Rayalu said AMA’s 2024-2026 SDP represented the continuation of AMA’s effort to assist farmers and enhance the agriculture sector.
“The overarching goal of this plan is to enhance our marketing coordination efforts by generating a significant increase in local production,” Mr Rayalu said.
“We aim to achieve this through a substantial shift towards sustainable agricultural practices and methods that are environmentally friendly while also improving human nutrition.”
To that end, he added, the key objectives of AMA’s SDP are to increase sustainable market linkages, improve commercial agricultural footprints, diversify agriculture and aquaculture products, identify and develop potential international markets and support agricultural activities.
