New taro varieties developed

Updated October 17, 2008 10:45:06

Samoan researchers have developed three new varieties blight-resistant taro. The leaf blight wiped out much of the island's taro crops a decade ago. The Crops Division of the Nu'u Research Centre have trialed, taste-tested and cultivated for mass production

Tania Lee
Speaker:CEO of the Nu'u Research Centre of Samoa's Ministry of Agriculture, Asuao Kirifi Pouono.

The collapse of taro exports in 1994, forced exporters to increase production of copra, coconut oil, and fish. Now the focus is back on taro. The three new varieties are called, Talo So'o, Talo Tonu and Talo Taua, after the Samoa's Minister of Agriculture... Taua Kitiona.

Asuao Kirifi Pouono, CEO of the Nu'u Research Centre of Samoa's Ministry of Agriculture says the new varieties of taro will be popular.

POUONO: It's very much similar to the kind of taro that we used to have, Talo Niue or Talo Samoa. The taste is very much like the taste that we are looking for. Well we call it in Samoa, we call it Mapo. Mapo, meaning it's quite firm, and it's got a lot of starch and it's good quality to eat.

LEE: Are the new taro varieties the same colour?

POUONO: Yes, it's reddish in colour. You know when you see it, it's very similar to the one that we like.

LEE: And is it the same size as well?

POUONO: Again, it yields pretty good. I suppose what we are looking for is really the taste and then we will start building up the yield qualities and so forth.

LEE: The research centre also developed two other types of taro. Tell me about them.

POUONO: I know we have just released three new varities and that will add to another piece of the breeding program which which upto now is more than twenty. We have collected more than twenty different varieties from breeding program.

LEE: Taro farmers were hit by the leaf blight in 1993, which affected many crops, are the new varieties resistant to the taro blight?

POUONO: Not fully, not a one hundred percent resistance. But there is a degree of tolerance to the taro leaf blight. As far as the strategies they we're using, in our breeding program, I don't think we can be able to get a one hundred resisting tool to the blight.

We are not working on multiplying the three types, as well as the other types in our collection that we've just released mind you it's starts from one planting material so it's already going out to the farmers to be mass produced in great numbers. Hopefully by the end of the year we should have quite a bit for the farmers.

LEE: And will the new varieties be available overseas?

POUONO: Not now, I think we are more interested in getting the materials available to our farmers. Of course as far as our overseas counterparts go, there's already an agreement whereby the others can have access to our material.