Acting as panelists during the first annual CNMI specialty crop conference, the businessmen also stressed the need for a long-term plan on the part of farmers.
The panelists who also answered questions regarding agri-tourism subjects were Hotel Association of Northern Marianas Island president Nick Nishikawa, Century Insurance CEO David Sablan and Wolf Mojica of Duty Free Shoppers.
“If you can’t provide what we need we will go somewhere else,” Mojica said during the whole day conference at the Fiesta Resort & Spa.
The conference theme was “Strengthening specialty crops’ competitiveness and marketability.”
Mojica said there are local products that sell well like dried papaya, dried mango, Tinian hot pepper in Tinian and Saipan tropical cookies.
Nishikawa said hotel chefs must meet high standards when preparing the daily menu.
High quality products should be available every day, he said.
Sablan said Singapore encourages tourists to plant trees so they will come back to check them.
In the CNMI, he said, the government can designate an area for that purpose as part of an agri-tourism program.
Participant Jess Castro asked businessmen if they can reduce their imported seasonal crops and allow local farmers to supply them during a certain period of the year.
“The amount of product we move every year is astounding,” Wolf said, as he cited an example of a local trader who has been doing business with them for three years now but can’t fully supply their needs.
Specialty Crop producers president and TJ Enterprise owner Frank Atalig of Rota sees the potential of the CNMI to produce competitive agricultural products.
“But we are not doing anything. We talk too much and do little. Why don’t we change that attitude? Stop blaming the government. You blame yourself first,” he added.
For the past years, he said, the U.S. Department of the Interior has been sponsoring workshops on transportation, agriculture, fish products and export commodities.
But nothing has been done to implement any of the good ideas discussed in the past, he added. “We should be working on these ideas not talking about them again,” he said.
Atalig, the keynote speaker of the conference, sees the potential of the CNMI to export agricultural produce to Guam.
About $34 million worth of fresh fruits are coming to Guam from outside sources, he said.
He said the CNMI can generate a lot of revenue from agriculture. “I believe we should focus on that. We have the natural resources for it,” he added.
On Rota, he said there are nonresidents who have been doing well in the sweet potato business.
“The locals are watching and getting mad. But it’s their fault that they are not doing anything. Everyone has the right to go into business,” he added.
Besides, he said, there are still a lot of available lots for farming in the CNMI.
Atalig said breadfruit, for example, is all over the island and can be a specialty crop, adding that Felix Calvo, an agriculture consultant to NMC CREES has successfully turned breadfruit into flour.
He said the market for this product has been available for years “it just that we’re not doing anything about it — we’re just fond of complaining and that’s our problem.”
