Pacific

Vanuatu's Agriculture Minister keen to increase cattle farming

10:46 am on 11 September 2013

Vanuatu's Minister for Agriculture says he wants to revive the former Vanuatu Livestock Farm in East Efate.

Once known as the Vanuatu Livestock Development Project, the farm concentrated on developing special breeds of cattle to suit the Vanuatu environment.

But in the 1980s most of the bulls were supplied to farmers around the country and the farm was eventually sold.

Now the current Minister, David Tosul, who has a farming background, wants to buy the land back and turn it into a cattle farm again.

He says with the current government policy to export live cattle, Mr Tosul says the government needs to increase the number of cattle farms it has to cater for a growing industry.