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About Land Resources Division

• LRD Structure
• LRD Strategic Plan

LRD is the newest division of SPC and brings together two previously separate programmes: agriculture and forestry. LRD’s goal is derived from SPC’s corporate vision:

To improve food security, increase trade and assist the Pacific Community to be more prosperous and healthy and manage their agricultural and forest resources in a sustainable way.

In its Strategic Plan 2005–2008, LRD is committed to work in collaboration with its stakeholders — Pacific Island countries and territories (PICTs), donor partners, and national, regional and international agricultural organisations — to achieve its two objectives:

i) sustainable management of integrated forest and agricultural systems

ii)  improved biosecurity and trade facilitation.

LRD places particular emphasis on an integrated and participatory approach to the development of sustainable agriculture and forestry. The division’s assistance has become more targeted to provide effective solutions to meet the different needs of PICTs. To be more effective in delivering its services, LRD is increasingly adopting a decentralised approach to extension, coordinated at the country level by staff within national agricultural systems. LRD will be innovative in identifying donor partners and moving towards multi-project and multi-donor resourcing of its work.

LRD will continue to strengthen PICTs’ capacity in plant protection, crop improvement, animal health and production, and sustainable forestry management and development. At the same time, LRD will develop capacity in new initiatives such as policy analysis and advice and support for agricultural science, technology and innovations.

Within the limits of available resources, LRD will deal with current and emerging challenges facing member countries and territories in the agriculture and forestry sectors. For example, PICTs’ need for developing appropriate downstream agro-processing industries rather than concentrating on the export of fresh produce will be addressed. This need makes the presence within LRD of a strong agricultural marketing advice capacity. There are land use issues in PICTs that affect agricultural development and natural resource management, and LRD will work to help PICTs strengthen their capacity in addressing these issues.

Crop production also presents particular challenges in the areas of soil fertility improvement, mitigating water shortages in production systems and improving the utility and effectiveness of agriculture laboratories of PICTs and of relevant regional agencies.

In the area of forestry, emphasis will be on strengthening PICTs’ capacity to implement sustainable forest management and develop appropriate policies, strategies and legislation.

In the livestock sector, a major effort will be made to reverse the tendency in countries and donor partners to assign generally low priority to its development, despite consumption of livestock products increasing at a substantial rate.

Animal diseases, particularly zoonoses (those that pass from animals to humans), are a significant emerging public health concern for the Pacific.

LRD will continue to work to strengthen its partnerships with other regional and international organisations, including FAO, PIFS, ACIAR, GTZ, USP, ADAP and SPREP, and to avoid duplication and add value to the efforts of each agency. AusAID, NZAID, French AID and EU are LRD’s traditional donor partners and have contributed significantly to the development of agriculture and forestry in the region.