The Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock is looking at encouraging famers in the Central Province to grow cocoa in the province and boost the local economy. 

With the increased demand for cocoa beans, Minister for Agriculture and Livestock, John Simon recently announced a proposed plan to establish a big nursery at Kuriva in Central province to allow local famers to get cocoa seedlings and plant cocoa on their land. 

“There is a big potential here at Central Province which is already growing good cocoa beans here at Kuriva.

The government is donating 168ha in Botum Sakor National Park in Koh Kong to the Royal Group to build a 700MW coal-fired power plant.

A sub-decree obtained by The Post on Sunday said the Ministry of Environment has to work in collaboration with the Ministry of Economy and Finance and others to prepare the deal.

The Post could not contact Royal Group chairman Neak Oknha Kith Meng for comment about the size of the investment.

Intensive farming makes future pandemics such as Covid-19 more likely as wild animals carrying diseases known to infect humans are forced into increasingly close contact with us, a research report showed on Wednesday.

Writing in the journal Nature, a team of researchers from University College London (UCL) warned that animal pathogens are increasingly likely to make the leap to humans as land-use changes benefit animal hosts.

The UN estimates that three-quarters of land on Earth has been severely degraded by human activity since the start of the industrial era.

More than 30 Cambodian-Muslim families protested the construction of a road running through Kampong Chhnang province’s Chhong Kos village on Wednesday after they noticed a portion of an ancestral graveyard alongside the road was damaged.

The Cambodian-Muslim community also noticed the road was being built at a higher elevation, another reason they protested the construction, said Mat Sary, an imam (religious leader) in the community located in Kampong Chhnang town’s Khsam commune.

Emmanuel Okas Wike is the President, Nigerian Institution of Estate Surveyors and Valuers. He spoke to ANN GODWIN in Port Harcourt on how the Land Use Act has undermined professional practice, measures that could transform the real estate sector, and the role of estate surveyors in developing the economy.

Executive Director of the Centre for Women in Agriculture and Nutrition (C-WAN), Emmanuel Wullingdool, has appealed to the government to create agricultural land banks to enable the vulnerable groups in society to have access to fertile land for farming purposes.

He said the vulnerable groups, including women, could register with the government at the district levels to acquire those productive lands to farm.

The steering team of the Ghana Gold Expo has issued a press briefing that the premiere issue of the Ghana Gold Report 2020 will be released on June 15, 2020.

The steering team is led by Dr Steven Blessing Ackah and MP for Takoradi, Kwabena Okyere Darko Mensah.

Fires have spread across the majority of the landscape in Angola and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Fires of this number are not uncommon at this time of year in Africa. During the agricultural season of clearing field and planting new ones, farmers set fire to the remains of old crop fields to rid them of the leftover grasses and scrub.

Some 50 people representing more than 100 families locked in a land dispute in Kampong Thom province’s Kraya commune, in Santuk district, travelled to Phnom Penh to submit a petition at the National Assembly, the Prime Minister’s Cabinet and the Ministry of Interior on Monday and Tuesday.

The petitioners, who are also requesting intervention in the land dispute to acquire authorised land titles, accused provincial authorities of an attempt to jail them, but provincial governor Sok Lou denied this.

Land issues have forced work for the K2 billion PNG-China Integrated Agriculture Park Project in Korofeigu, outside Goroka town to stop.

Eastern Highlands Governor Peter Numu explained that negotiations led to the idea that the land would be given to the Chinese company.

It is understood that the Department of Agriculture and Livestock was not properly informed on the process and disagreed placed on a misunderstanding that the land had been sold to the Chinese company, believed to be China Railway International.

CHANTHABURI: A man and his son have been arrested for making false statements and embezzlement over a land dispute that led to last year’s multiple shooting in a Chanthaburi courtroom.

Officers from the Crime Suppression Division’s Hanuman special force on Tuesday morning executed a search warrant at a house in tambon Khlong Phlu of Khao Kitchakut district of this eastern province.

They arrested house owner Boonchuay Charoensathaporn, 80, and his son Kittipong Charoensathaporn, 43.

The National Agricultural Land Development Authority (NALDA) says it has made plans to help 77,400 people set up farms.

According to the agency, the farmers would be drawn from across the 774 local governments areas of the country.

NALDA was created by Ibrahim Babangida, a former military ruler, in 1992 through decree No.92 but in 2000 it was abolished by former President Olusegun Obasanjo.

President Muhammadu Buhari resuscitated the agency in May.