Agricultural ambitions
The Republic of Palau is a well-known tourist destination that has few natural resources and must import much of its food. Moreover, many of its residents have a relaxed attitude towards life and tend not to save. Often strapped for cash at the end of the month, they make do with meals made from canned foods and instant noodles.
The International Cooperation and Development Fund’s (ICDF) technical mission in Palau is seeking to increase the availability of food on the islands by improving local agricultural technology. Lai Yijun, a TYOS participant assigned to Palau, is a graduate of the Department of Horticulture and Landscape Agriculture at National Taiwan University. Lai has been interested in agriculture since high school, and used to spend his free time helping his father manage the family’s farmland. He also spent one year of his university career as an exchange student in Japan, studying Japanese agriculture in Akita Prefecture and reaffirming his desire to pursue a career in the field.
The Palau technical mission’s horticultural production program has been conserving seeds and producing seedlings on a model farm for a number of years. More recently, the program has also begun promoting campus gardens. The team provides participating schools with both resources and advice, and inspects the gardens every Tuesday.
When Lai first arrived in Palau, he helped technicians grow seedlings. A few months later, he tried his hand at planning seed and seedling quantities and varieties, which required him to make use of the “plug seedling” techniques he’d learned in school. “The timing and effectiveness of separating and transplanting seedlings determines how well they will ultimately grow,” explains Lai.
The farm also works with a Japanese travel agency in Palau to bring Japanese tourists in for visits. When they come, Lai uses his Japanese language skills to help out the guides.
The farm’s Japanese visitors often exclaim in surprise at how different the crops grown in Palau’s tropical-rainforest climate are from those grown in Japan’s temperate climate.
Lai also handles correspondence with a Palau-based Japanese research group that sometimes requests resources from the technical mission.
Over the last few years, Lai has applied the horticultural skills he learned in Taiwan to both temperate Japan and tropical Palau. The experience has taught him how to adjust his cultivation techniques to different environments, and enabled him to combine the techniques he has acquired in the field with the fruits of his academic research.
With interest in agricultural work in decline, Lai believes it is more essential than ever for young people to take up farming. He says he is happy to be one of them.
Lai Yijun’s work in Palau has furthered his passion for and understanding of agriculture. (courtesy of Lai Yijun)