More fruit for the labour

South-South Cooperation turns simple solutions into greater income for tropical fruit farmers in Sri Lanka

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SHANTHA Dissanayake, a mango farmer in northern Sri Lanka, has spent a lot of time worrying about elephants stomping over his mango orchards.

But he became even more scared when agricultural experts came from abroad and hacked his trees down to relative shadows of their former selves.

“These outsiders came and hacked down all my trees to stubs with only a few leaves left. They looked close to dead,” he said. “However, this experiment has turned out a complete success,” he added.

The trees are much shorter than before, with fewer but wider branches that allow sunlight to boost fruit quality and naturally prevent plant diseases. “Now I see that it works,” said Shantha, a 53-year-old man in perpetual good spirits, whose hobby and obsession is fixing a rusty old tractor he used as a younger farmer growing squash and maize.

Less tree, more mangoes

Zengxian Zhao, the man who cut the trees in the first place, laughed at Shantha’s memory. “He was initially shocked, but he’s been convinced and is spreading the word,” said Zengxian, an expert on crop cultivation, dispatched by China’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs.

He was deployed in 2023 in this Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) project focused on Sri Lanka’s tropical fruit sector, aiming to boost the incomes of the farmers who produce bananas, pineapples and mangoes, high-value fruits that can flourish in the country.

“Here the farmers know how to make mango trees big, tall and very strong,” Zengxian said while chatting with Shantha on his farm outside Anuradhapura. It has become a kind of exposition centre where Shantha’s neighbours come to learn about the new techniques being shared through the FAO-China South-South Cooperation (SSC) project.

“T explain and show Chinese pruning methods that are very different,” Zengxian said. “We are looking to make more of the plant nutrients flow to the fruits.”