Reddy Heaps Praise On Naveicovatu For Planting Vetiver Grass

The initiative by villagers from Naveicovatu, Wainibu­ka in Tailevu, to plant veti­ver grass 400 metres along the river bank in a bid to prevent soil erosion has received praise from Govern­ment.

The Minister for Agriculture, Ru­ral and Maritime Development, Wa­terways and Environment, Mahen­dra Reddy, commended the villagers when he commissioned the Naveico­vatu Vetiver Project last Thursday.

“The villagers also planted fruit trees to support nutritional secu­rity in the village with the surplus going to roadside stalls or markets on weekends for their income secu­rity,” he said.

Minister Reddy said there were multiple benefits associated with promoting vetiver for riverbank and slope stabilisation.

“Vetiver grass conserves the soil and prevents soil erosion and water retention in the farmlands,” he said.

“It is a low-cost bio-engineering tool. It is a green technology and, as such, helps to sequestrate carbon.”

The tensile of vetiver roots is strong and long (2-3.5m) and has massive root networks, which are very fast-growing. It is better than many types of trees which normally take two to three years to be effec­tive.

Mr Reddy said the vetiver system was a very simple, practical, in­expensive and effective biological measure for soil and water conser­vation.

Vetiver grass was introduced to Fiji more than 100 years ago and it has been widely used for soil and water conservation purposes for more than 50 years.

“It has been an important compo­nent of soil erosion control on the sugar cane lands around Lautoka and Rakiraki from the 1960s until fairly recently,” he said.

Edited by Percy Kean

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