BY LYNTON AARON FILIA
juice that bound for Brisbane earlier this year.
FIFTEEN thousand bottles of purified and concentrated Solomon Noni juice are out and sold in the Australian market, it is reported.
The North West Guadalcanal constituency revealed that 20 tonnes of Noni produce taken to Australia recently as sample from Solomon Islands has yielded 15,000 bottles out in the market in Australia.
This was revealed in an exclusive interview with the Chairman of the North West Guadalcanal Subsistence Farmers Association Mr Francis Orodani yesterday.
Orodani said MP Bodo Dettke and his wife will be going to Berlin this month for an Expo on Solomon Noni but it will be under the Australian flag.
“The government is not really promoting it, so sad to say that but this Expo and marketing activities will be work under different flag which is Australia flag,” Orodani said.
Orodani explains that the couple are flying the Australian flag because the Solomon Islands government does not recognise Noni as an official export product.
“We already reach out to government and have been corresponding with each other.
“At the moment, the Noni association is planning on having a factory because the interest in this type of business is increasing to people of the North West Guadalcanal constituency.
“This development still needs to come out at this stage when the government recognizes the product, and if this is one of country’s economic recoveries then surely Noni needs to come up as national sector.”
Meanwhile, Noni fruit is sold in local market at $3 per kilo and as time goes it will rise to $6.
Currently, they are paying Noni every day at King George VI particularly members of the Noni Association.
At the moment Australian is the only market for Solomon Noni, and it will be under the Australian branding, not Solomon Islands.
It is reported that MP Bodo Dettke has been purchasing land and sub-dividing them to people of North West Guadalcanal who are registered under the Noni association. This land is meant for noni plantation.
Interest in such business is also high with people keep flooding to North West Guadalcanal constituency office at Point Cruz to get registration form.
