Participants of the 5th International Symposium for the Development of Integrated Pest Management for Sustainable Agriculture in Asia and Africa went on a field trip to Sabah Agriculture Park on 20th December 2012.
This park is set against a background of truly natural landscape with lush greenery of the Crocker Range, the longest in the country. It functions as both an educational and recreational park with more than 1000 species of plants. The park is divided into 21 mini gardens with magnificent collection of plants and flowers. One of the mini gardens that has a collection of crop plants is the “Living Crop Museum”.
Living Crop Museum
The Living Crop Plant Museum has 15 major sections, which demonstrates the great diversity of tropical crop plants and how man uses them. The museum has a collection of more than 400 species of economic value grouped in accordance with their uses, such as fruits, spices and condiments, beverages, oil, fibres and nuts.
Tropical Fruits Section
There are over 200 species of local and introduced fruits from South America, Africa, India, Australia. Rambutan, pulasan, mangosteen, and durian are commonly grown. Participants showed fondness of pulasan, especially with its green and black variations.
In addition to that, the wild species shown below (Couroupita guianensis), locally known as pokok tongkat langit, generated much excitement among the crowd but subsided after being informed that the rounded fruits were not edible.
Visit to Guava Farm-Tenom
The guava farm is located at Inubai Tenom, only accessible by vehicle though stretches of narrow and gravel roads. The owner of the farm is Chung Fui Lan, cultivating about 4 ha of guava and rambutan. The main crop being guava and able to produce 6-7 mt/month, earning approximately US$ 3000-3500 per month.
The fruits are mainly sold to big cities of Kota Kinabalu and Bandar Seri Begawan. Chung explained that she practiced integrated pest control approaches by bagging the fruits in managing the pest and diseases.
The farm has also obtained Good Agriculture Practices Certification from the Department of Agriculture, Malaysia in 2009. Chung proudly announced that she was awarded the ‘Best Farmer of the year’ in fruit category during the Malaysian Agricultural Exposition Event in 2008.