The batch of oil palm seeds arrived the second week in September -- 14.200 seeds for farmer's associations and 800 seeds for ACDI Lusekele's plantations. Groups usually receive 100 to 400 seeds, depending on experience and number of families in the group. Philippe, Philo and Fidele conducted a one day grower's workshop to walk the new growers through nursery planting and to remind the old hands of the critical points they may have forgotten. I think there were over 75 participants.
This morning Brother Kurt told me that nearly all the palm seeds in the Lusekele nursery have survived the first 8 weeks -- well over 90% emergence and many bags have two or three plants. Compare this to last year when fungal diseases killed one-quarter of the germinating palms.
Philippe and Bidimbu left this afternoon for another round of extension visits. They will be gone three days, helping a couple of associations distribute cuttings of the new mosaic resistant varieties to new village groups. ACDI's four-agent team makes close to 80-90 visits per month to check on the progress of palm nurseries, palm plantations, manioc multiplication fields, peanut variety trials and peanut multiplication fields of associations in the ACDI network.
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