FAO and Oman work to develop the national citrus industry

2 October 2018, Muscat - The Government of the Sultanate of Oman aims to develop the citrus industry sector by improving the programme on the production and multiplication of citrus plant propagative materials through the production of certified “free of pathogens” citrus plant materials.

During an inception workshop today, FAO and Oman launched a new project “Development, production, multiplication and dissemination of certified Citrus propagating materials”.

This project’s main purpose is to strengthen the already existing facilities of the previous certification programme (greenhouses, screen houses, tunnels, nurseries, laboratories, etc.), and to review and assess the required updating, in order to improve the efficiency of those facilities and set up a work plan for building up a complete certification programme including the needed protocols and training on diagnosis of citrus graft-transmissible diseases in the laboratory.

Furthermore, the second aim of this project is to improve nurserymen organization and raising awareness for the use of true-to-type and healthy planting material through a certification scheme to secure higher quality nursery planting materials. The attention was to be focused also on evaluating the facilities needed for mass production and distribution of the certified plants originated from primary sources and mother plants. The project will also identify governmental and private sector actors to be involved directly and indirectly in implementing the legislating process for the certification programme and relative protocols for inspections.