«In Pictures»

The International Symposium on Tropical Fruits 2024 will be organized in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia 22-24 Oct.

The details of the event is available with the attached poster.

A meeting to discuss about the Palm Kernel Cake (PKC) was held on 3 October 2021 at Dairy Products Supportive Fund. Mr. Hisamuddin Md. Aspar, manager for Central Asia, Iraq, Afghanistan and Iran on behalf of Malaysian Palm Oil Board and Hossein Shahbaz, director of Public Relation and International Cooperation, SFIDA and 5 CEOs of Agriculture Supporting Funds on behalf of SFIDA attended the meeting.

A presentation made by Hisamuddin explained about the benefits of the PKC and mentioned that Malaysia produces almost 2.5 million tones annually and all are exported to different countries such as New Zealand, Vietnam, The Netherlands, Germany, and etc. Studies show that PKC is a good substitution to wheat and rice bran and also some part of the other meals such as Soya and cotton meals. PKC contains less (almost half) protein than Soya Meal but the price is less than 30% and it is available year round. The following table shows the compound of the PKC. It contains more fat which can increase the fat in the milk to increase the price of the milk.

It was supposed to have another meeting to discuss in detail at Livestock Development Fund office.

Finally, Hisamuddin proposed to have a trial PKC use in Animal Feed collaboratively with SFIDA. He was requested to send a proposal to SFIDA to examine it.

Chair of the Board and CEO of the SFIDA, Dr. J. Behzad Nasab, in a meeting with the Parliament Members of North Khorasan Province on Wednesday, August 4, 2021 said: Barriers to Agricultural Production, which is on the agenda of the Islamic Consultative Assembly can be used as an opportunity to organize the important issues of the market, the financial and credit system and investment in the agriculture sector. It can improve productivity and remove barriers of production by the farmers’ community.

He added: Funds for Agriculture have many supportive laws for equipping and developing which can be the executive arm to strengthen the country’s food security and remove obstacles to production in the agriculture sector.

Alizadeh Moghadam, member of the board and deputy CEO of SFIDA, referring to some articles of the national program entitled: “Plan to strengthen the country’s food security and remove barriers to production in the agriculture sector,” said: The articles of this plan can be modified to serve the farming community. Addressing  the problems of the financing system in the agricultural sector, he stated: ” To address this problem, funds to support the development of the agricultural sector with the aim of capital formation, expanding  the volume and quality of investment with the share more than 51% owned by producers and 49% owned by the Ministry of Agriculture Jahad were set up”. These funds are a joint stock company and are governed by commercial law.

He told: Currently, 162 funds to support the development of the agricultural sector in the form of provincial, county, women, national, natural and regional funds with a capital of two thousand and 500 billion Tomans have been formed. Also, Abdullah Yousefi, head of the North Khorasan Agriculture Jahad Organization and representative of the SFIDA in the North Khorasan Provincial Fund, explained on the performance of eight County funds and the provincial fund in financing, helping to provide the required inputs and marketing of agricultural products of the province. In the meeting, emphasis was placed on quantitative development, capital increase and realization of capital adequacy of funds to support the development of the agriculture sector and the share of government in funds to support the development of the agriculture sector of the province.