This Quarterly Digest reports the positive efforts by Pacific countries to make agricultural information available to the public. Up to now, it has been difficult for anyone including the media to easily access key sector information such as plans, policies or commodity information. Through PAPP, Vanuatu and Solomon Islands have already released “Agriculture Policy Banks”, essentially online libraries of national agricultural information. All countries also have information available through the PAPP hosted PAFPnet policy bank portal. www.spc.int/pafpnet/

In addition, a significant link between the Agriculture and Tourism sectors has been formalised in the first Pacific Agritourism Week by SPC and a host of partners including SPTO, PIPSO and USP. The week-long event was intended to raise policy attention on domestic markets like tourism and how these markets provide immense opportunities for farmers and the agricultural sector if we can strategically work together. Tourism continues to be a bright spot for the region, growing sustainably at 3.5 percent per annum for the last five and indications re that these growth rates will continue to be sustained. Already, Vanuatu, Cook Islands and Fiji are pursuing the linkages between agriculture and tourism at the national level.

PAPP continues to support organisations such as PIFON through meaningful exchanges such as the Pacific Soil Learning Exchange. This collaboration has encouraged dialogue across the sector on challenges such as greater food security for the region. We are happy to share the article and video below with you detailing what transpired at the last learning exchange.