Vanilla Value Chain 

The northwestern part of Papua New Guinea has a unique agro-ecological environment with a great potential to cultivate many globally in-demand valuable and expensive agricultural economic products such as vanilla. If produced, processed, and marketed in enough quantity and with the best quality, vanilla as the world’s second most expensive spice can contribute significantly to the country’s economy.
Despite this huge potentiality, vanilla is mainly planted at the household, subsistence level on small plots, and farmers are not well equipped with knowledge on improved production practices and proper drying and quality attributes.
Besides, insufficient investment, support, capacity, and infrastructures left the region less prepared and provided with resources to tap into this potentiality and take the course toward sustainable vanilla value chain development.

Adopted Approach

To address these gaps and support triggering a transformational, durable change, the EU-STREIT PNG, in close partnership with the East and West Sepik Provincial Divisions of Agriculture and Livestock (DAL), stakeholders and local farmer groups, provides support and offers technical assistance to the vanilla farmers, agripreneurs and local Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprise (MSMEs) as well as governmental authorities to increase the economic returns and opportunities through sustainable development of this value chain.
In this respect, the Programme provides support to increase profitability of farmers producing vanilla in the Programme's targeted areas, works on increasing number of people and enterprises engaging in and benefiting from improved vanilla value chain development, and ensuring women and youth involvement in decision-making process with increased income from vanilla value chain activities.
As part of this inclusive approach, the Programme supports on  improving existing vanilla blocks for farm families in the Programme implementation's areas, promoting sustainable and improved climate-change adapted practices, developing and promoting improved drying, curing, packaging and storage of vanilla beans, enhancing market access and linkages of value chain actors at provincial, national and international levels, strengthening women and youth engagement in and benefitting from vanilla value chain activities, and strengthening the capacity for adaptive collaborative research and vanilla demonstration facilities of regional technical institutions.