The Ministry of Agriculture and Plantation Industry has decided to plant 400 hectares of coffee in the next year.
Mahinda Amaraweera, the Minister of Agriculture and Plantation Industries, says that the President Ranill Wickremesinghe allocated Rs.400 million to extend coffee Cultivation in 2024.
The minister also mentioned that although coffee cultivation is not currently grown as a main plantation crop in our country, taking into account the high demand in the foreign market for coffee in this country, this step is taken with the aim of popularizing and extending coffee cultivation as a plantation crop again.
Accordingly, an amount of one million rupees will be given per hectare and the minister instructed the officials to take measures to encourage the farmers who are interested in coffee cultivation.
The Ministry of Agriculture and Plantation Industries has allocated an amount of 96 billion rupees for the year 2024 through the budget document and the minister revealed this in a discussion regarding the efficient and effective use of the money.
Our country is famous for coffee cultivation and Coffea Arabica (Arabica coffee), Coffea Canephora (Robusta coffee) and Libarica coffee verities are grown in our country. Among these, Arabica coffee is the most popular type of coffee and the Minister instructed the Export Agriculture Department to give priority to the cultivation of that coffee.
Several new varieties of Arabica coffee have been introduced to cultivators. They are called HTD, S09, Katimur, Lakparakum, Lak Saviru and Lak Komali. These varieties are the highest yielding varieties.
In addition, several local species of Robusta coffee have also been introduced. They are IMY, S274, GCR, CCI, Lanka Chandra, Lanka Bhimsara and Lanka Isuru.
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