The Livestock Development Corporation Ltd has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with two new Policy and Legal consultants to proceed with the outstanding Livestock Development Corporation (LDC) Bill and the Livestock Policy.
LCD Chairman Martin Ginyaru and Managing Director Terry Koim signed the MoU with the consultants in Port Moresby today.
Mr Koim said the MoU is to empower the consultants to proceed with a nationwide consultation towards formulation of a legislature.
He said the LDC Board & management expects to have a draft policy ready for tabling in the November Parliament.
“We have done a lot of rehabilitation under the MTDP III. We have done rehabilitation, we have done restocking and we are now trying to put this in a policy context. The policy that we are trying to set up, will be aligned to the MTDP_IV, which has been recently launched by the government, at the APEC Haus,” said Koim.
The company has engaged an animal vet to complete the process of the preparation for the Livestock bill which began in 2010-2011 and 2012.
“We will also be doing the livestock bill. The livestock bill was previously drafted in 2010, 2011 and 2012. We are privileged to have Dr. Nime Kapo who is a veterinarian by profession, he is an animal vet,” stated Koim.
He has been working with NAQIA for a very longtime and while he was working with NAQIA he was doing this Livestock Bill.”
Koim said currently the government-owned livestock are very minimal so the LDC is trying to revive it.
But further improvement and protection is not happening because there is no policy or legislature to set the framework for the livestock projects.
“When you talk about livestock, where is it? It’s everywhere. On the coast, in the highlands, and in the outer islands, where they are floating over the sea. So livestock affects everybody.
“So our consultations will be for all the four regions. We’ll do it in the Southern Region, we will do it in Momase, we will do it in up in the highlands and we will do it in the Niugini Islands,” Koim said.
He thanked the Prime Minister Marape for taking the bold step to come up with the livestock bill in 2020. Now the department is able to start on the consultations and awareness on the reviving of the livestock industry.
He said currently, the government has about 1600 cattle in the country, which is a very low number.
With the legislature in place the department will be able to have a legal platform to go through processes of importing cattle from Australia to increase the number of cattle stock in the country to create viable livestock businesses.