The Ministry of Agriculture’s Home Gardening Programme which was implemented during the country’s first lockdown in March 2020 has since seen the Ministry distribute more than 1 million packs of seeds.
This was revealed by Minister for Agriculture, Waterways and Environment, Dr Mahendra Reddy during a press conference held today, at the Ministry of Agriculture’s Headquarters in Grantham Road, Raiwaqa, Suva.
He also shared that the Ministry would be revamping the Home Gardening programme this year with the distribution of an additional 10,000 seed packages around the country.
"You may recall in March 2020, amid our first lockdown, the Ministry of Agriculture launched a COVID response initiative - ‘Home Gardening Program’ and under the initiative, the Ministry of Agriculture provided gardening seed packages to all households in urban and peri-urban areas around Fiji."
We started seed distribution on 30 March 2020 and so far, we have distributed a total of 203,792 seed packages to 203,792 households around the country.
“Each seed package consisted of 4 to 6 varieties of short growing crops. So, individually we have packed and supplied 1,018,960 packs of seeds,” he added.
From Monday 10th January, the Ministry will make available another 10,000 seed packages to be distributed around the country.
The seed package will consist of 5 varieties of seeds namely cucumber, long bean, French bean, eggplant, and sponge gourd.