PNG Government offers to jointly fund a feasibilitystudy to establish Chocolate factory in Wewak
Minister for Trade Commerce & Industry, Hon Richard Maru met with Mr Marc Pauwels, the Managing Director of ‘Belgian Famous Chocolates’ who led a European Trade delegation to PNG to canvas investment opportunities in the country.
“I am pleased on behalf of the Government to offer to partner your company to jointly fund a comprehensive feasibility study by next month to assess the commercial viability of setting up a fully intergrated cocoa business in East Sepik Province. The study will include assessing Government land to set up a cocoa nucleus estate from seed nurseries to planting cocoa on a company owned cocoa estate with extensive support to outgrowers all the way to setting up and building a factory to manufacture cocoa and its by-products”, said Minsiter Maru.
He said the Government is prepared to contribute 50 percent of the cost of conducting a full feasibility study and have chosen Wewak in East Sepik Province considering the province currently produces 16 tonnes of cococa a year.
Minister Maru told the management of the Chocolate company that Papua New Guinea is a major producer of very high quality cocoa beans and the country is now moving away from exporting semi-processed beans offshore and now going into downstream processing.
“We are now looking at processing all our cocoa into final products here in the country”, said Minister Maru.
“Our country has been adversly affected by cocoa prices around the world because globally we are not a big producer. In terms of the economic value, we think our farmers could earn a lot more with the building of a Chocolate factory in the country”, said Minister Maru.
Minister Maru said in regards to future trading, all raw materials must be processed in the country BUT with the full understanding that all our products must be globally competitive.
“We are now looking at partners like yourselves who can come in and partner the Government to establish a Chocolate processing plant in the country to exclusively manufacture chocolate and other value added products to supply both our local domestic needs and the eighty countries you operate in.
The Managing Director for the Belgian Famous Chocolate company, Mr Marc Pauwel said the companies travelled into PNG to see if there are investment opportunities in PNG and also how their companies can contribute to develop and add value to the cocoa industry in the country.
Mr Pauwel said his company is pleased to offer their expertise to establish factories that will in turn create job opportunities.
He also stressed that not only will they concerntrate on the chcolate factory BUT they can also look at producing other products such as fertilizer, vinegar and cocoa drinks through the process of fermentation.
Meanwhile Minister Maru said that East Sepik Province is currently the major cocoa producer in the country and that it is strategically placed to set up a processing plant.
“East Sepik is located closer to Indonesia and is also the gateway to other Asian countries and therefore is a suitable location where a factory can be built at. The provincial capital, Wewak currently has land available within its wharf area that can be used to develop a cocoa factory in East Sepik Province ”, said Minister Maru.
He also announced that there is adequate state land that can be provided for a cocoa company nucleus estate operation.
“We are looking at expanding our cocoa production in the furtue and with your patnership we can make that possible. We can also take advantage of the Interim Economic Partnership Agreement (IEPA) between Europe and PNG which allow PNG’s Agriculture and Fisheries products to access the European market duty free”, he said.
Minister Maru has formally written to the Belgian Chocolate Company highlighting the PNG Government’s offer to jointly fund the feasibility study and have highlighted that the Government would like the feasibility study to be undertaken by next month.
In the letter, Minister Maru also requested for the company to provide the “Terms of Reference” and the cost of the Study before next month. He assured the Belgian company that PNG will assemble a local expert team consisting of a food technology scientist, a cocoa agronomist and other technical support personnel to work with the company’s technical team to jointly carryout the feasibility study.
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