Copra — dried coconut meat processed into oil for fuel, cooking and beauty products — is the economic mainstay of remote outer atolls in the Marshall Islands, where most islanders survive on barely $1 per day.
The government’s planning office sees a link between economic hardships on remote islands and the increasing out-migration of islanders from these atolls to the two urban centers in this western Pacific nation of 54,000, and the increasing flow of islanders to America. “When we did a survey late last year on Jaluit Atoll, we found scores of abandoned homes,” said the government’s planning chief Carl Hacker on Friday. He added that outer islanders list “shipping” as one of their top concerns, and shipping directly relates to their ability to get copra to market so they can generate a few dollars for their families.
The 10-years from 2000 to 2009 saw 50,573 tons of copra milled at the Tobolar Copra Processing Plant, the lowest 10-year total since the 1950s when fewer than 50,000 tons were produced. The 1950s averaged 4,821 tons per year.
Statistics from the U.S. Department of Transportation show that during the 2000s, an annual average of more than 1,000 people from the Marshall Islands left to the U.S. The islands have a special treaty allowing visa-free travel to the United States.
Copra production has been on a gradual but steady decline since the 1970s, which produced the best years on record for copra activity in the country.
Shipping is the key to the copra industry in the country, since 95 percent of the production comes from remote islands scattered over 500,000 square miles of ocean area. In 2007, the government established a quasi-private Marshall Islands Shipping Corporation, dramatically increasing shipping service to the outer islands.
“We’re bringing so much copra from the outer islands now, we can’t keep up with payments (to the makers),” said Alson Kelen, the chairman of the shipping company’s board. The company relies on government subsidy, and delays in receiving funding — both to buy copra and for maintenance of vessels — slows the industry, he said.
“The shipping situation is a lot better than prior to 2006,” Hacker said.
From 1970 to 1979, copra makers produced 60,925 tons. No decade before or since records began being kept in 1951 has more than 60,000 tons been produced in a decade.
In the 1980s, the number declined to 56,585 tons. In the 1990s, copra production went down further to 52,604 tons and the decade just completed dropped to 50,573 tons.
Government records show that in the 10-years from 1970, five years produced more than 6,000 tons and one year went over 7,000 tons. Only one year slipped to under 5,000 tons.
In contrast, from 2000 to 2009, the Marshall Islands had its lowest-ever year of production at 2,791 tons, only two years in the 6,000 range and the most-ever — five — years with production between 4,000 and 5,000 tons.
The copra figures show that were it not for the last three years — 2007-2009 makers: not because people on the outer islands are not making it, but because they couldn’t get it to market.
Kelen said the shipping company during the last several months was bringing in copra so quickly from the outer islands that the Tobolar milling factory in Majuro could not keep up with the volume. “Our ships had to wait to off-load because there was no room in the warehouse (for more copra),” he said. “We were bringing it in too fast.”
The past three years included the second best year of production ever at 7,641 tons, and two years with slightly over 6,000 tons, making the decade look better than it was for the first seven years.
