In brief
A training program organized by China’s Hainan provincial foreign‑affairs office and the Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences opened on 10 November 2026 in southern Sri Lanka, aiming to improve banana, pineapple, and mango production techniques. The program builds on a successful FAO South‑South cooperation project that significantly boosted local yields while cutting fertilizer use.
On 10 November 2026 a three‑day training course on tropical fruit seedling propagation and high‑efficiency production techniques kicked off in the Southern Province of Sri Lanka, co‑organised by the Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences and the foreign‑affairs office of China’s Hainan Province.
Attendees, including agricultural technicians, researchers, students and fruit farmers from the Southern Province, received lectures and were led on field‑study tours to learn advanced cultivation methods for banana, pineapple and mango – the three most important tropical fruits for the region.
At the launch, Chinese Ambassador to Sri Lanka Wei Huaxiang expressed hopes that the training would further expand exchanges and cooperation in tropical agriculture, contribute Chinese solutions to the sustainable development of Sri Lanka’s agriculture and bring more benefits to the people of Sri Lanka. Sri Lankan agricultural official W.L.O. Manel noted that the training marked the beginning of broader prospects for agricultural cooperation between the two countries in the future.
The program follows a two‑year China‑FAO Sri Lanka South‑South Cooperation Project that ran from April 2023 to September 2025. In that period Chinese experts introduced fruit‑bagging and precise drip‑irrigation practices to local farmers across ten demonstration sites, boosting banana output by 70 percent and mango yield by over 50 percent while reducing fertilizer use by 72 percent.
Both sides see the training as a way to add to a solid foundation of cooperation in tropical‑fruit agriculture, a sector that has historically played a prominent role in China‑Sri Lanka relations. The programme’s goal is to equip Sri Lankans with techniques that can be scaled broadly, thereby strengthening the region’s sustainable agricultural development.
With the training now underway, officials expect the lessons learned to be disseminated throughout the Southern Province and beyond, potentially reshaping livestock and agronomy practices and enhancing the competitiveness of Sri Lanka’s tropical fruit sector on the global market.
