The first-ever training on Edible White Copra was conducted by the MBPGs Division of Agriculture and Livestock in partnership with the Kokonas Indastri Koperesen, recently.
The week long training was held at the Bubuleta Livestock and Agriculture Station outside of Alotau town. Participants were from the four districts of Milne Bay Province and also included six farmers from neighboring Magarida, Amazon Bay in Central Province.
During the training, Facilitating KIK officer, Harold Joseph introduced the theory on the production of Edible White Copra, and ended with practical hands-on experience.
The production process began with the husking of ten to thirteen-month-old dry coconuts, cracking them to remove embryos and water, drying them out in the sun for about two hours, then loading them into the dryer bed to dry further above heat piping heated by fire overnight. The next day dried copra was unloaded from the dryer, scooped, sorted out to identify only good white copra, bagged, and then weighed.
Relevant apparatus necessary to use during the production of edible white copra were also introduced to the farmers and they were Moisture Meter, Infrared Heat temperature thermometer and Simple Oven Thermometer.
Ede’ede representing the participants expressed gratitude to KIK and the MBPG Division of Agriculture and Livestock and said what they had learnt was new and they were ready to go back and experiment with their edible white copra production.
The Edible White Copra is currently produced in East New Britain and exported through KIKs marketing network, this was the first training for Milne Bay Province including participating Magarida farmers in Central Province.
