New nursery opens in Lautoka

The new Lololo Nursery in Lautoka will be one of the three nurseries in the country that will supply seedlings for the project catchment areas in the West and also the Government’s “30 Million Trees In 15 Years” initiative.

Speaking at the official opening of the nursery, Minister for Forestry Osea Naiqamu says the nursery has a holding capacity of 50,000 seedlings for native, fruit, and plantation tree species.

Naiqamu says this will add to the 35,000 nursery seedlings already in stock in the Ministry’s nursery in Lautoka.

He says 51 years ago, the nursery was known as the Lololo Forestry Training Centre where some of the people holding director-level positions got their basic forestry training from.

He adds that they are thankful to the Secretariat of Pacific Communities – Land Resources Division for providing the funding of $40,000 for the completion of the nursery.

The Minister says in Fiji, SPC’s work with the Ministry and Ministry of Agriculture is through the R2R project in creating awareness on the sustainable management of our forests and landscapes.

Since the launch of the “30 Million Trees In 15 Years” initiative last year, Fijians have planted a total of 2.6 million trees and mangroves across Fiji.