The first day of our Grafting Seminar was a huge success! Our original goal was to have 20 local farmers attend, but thanks to such a huge interest the turn out was over 40!
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| Paula and Dorise welcome the participants and introduce the grafting experts. |
In collaboration with the
Grenada Cocoa Association and
Ministry of Agriculture, we're hosting three leading grafting experts from the
Cocoa Research Centre in Trinidad.
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| We had a great turn out at the community center and Maran Nursery. |
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| Lunch and snacks were served by local food vendors in traditional, hand-carved calabash bowls. |
Dr. T.N. Sreenivasan, Annelle John-Holder and Vinosh Jadoo presented to the group in the morning, and in the afternoon everyone got to practice the different techniques on cocoa trees at the Maran Nursery in Gouyave.
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| Dr. Sreenivasan demonstrates how to cut healthy buds from the branch. |
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| Participants watch a demonstration of Patch Budding. |
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| A fresh bud attached to a small cocoa tree. |
Grafting is a technical method of improving the cocoa productivity of an existing tree. Our seminar provides farmers with the knowledge and tools they need to practice this technique on their own trees. Grafting can improve the shape of the tree (to make harvesting easier), and allows farmers to reproduce trees that are high in quality (based on productivity, pest resistance, etc.). It involves taking a bud from one branch and strategically attaching it to an existing tree, from which it will continue to grow!
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