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A quarantine on Oahu to try to contain the coffee berry borer is under consideration after the pest recently was discovered on the 155-acre Dole Food Hawaii coffee farm in Waialua.
Under proposed quarantine restrictions, coffee beans from Oahu would require treatment to kill coffee berry borer insects before leaving the island.
The proposal is slated to go before the state Board of Agriculture at 8 a.m. Tuesday at the plant quarantine office in Honolulu.
Darcy Oishi, the state Department of Agriculture’s biological control section chief, said restrictions under the quarantine would be similar to those on Hawaii island, where the coffee berry borer was first discovered in the state in September 2010.
The Waialua coffee farm is one of eight commercial coffee operations on Oahu.
Oishi said state agricultural officials haven’t inspected the seven other farms for the presence of coffee berry borers.
Farmers say the pest, which bores into coffee berries to lay its eggs, poses a significant threat to Hawaii’s $27 million coffee industry.
Oishi said an inspection at the Dole farm — the first mechanized harvesting operation to be affected by the coffee berry borer in Hawaii — revealed some areas with no pests while other areas had significant infestation.
"There is enough there that eradication would be extremely difficult," Oishi said.
Dole Food Hawaii General Manager Daniel Nellis, interviewed Thursday, said his firm is cooperating with the state’s move to impose a quarantine on its Waialua coffee farm.
"We’re going to restrict access and impose a control program," Nellis said.
Nellis said he doesn’t know when the coffee berry borer was introduced into the farm but maintains it must have been within the past year because the farm conducts annual surveys for pests and none had been found during the last check.
He said the firm is developing a strategy to control the coffee berry borer. "We are cooperating to get to the root of the problem and solve it. … We will survive it," he said.
The pest was discovered by federal agricultural researchers who were conducting studies about the flowering of coffee.
On Dec. 4, state agricultural entomologists examining samples from the Dole farm confirmed the presence of the coffee berry borer.
State officials said they’re worried the pest might spread to other islands under coffee cultivation, including Molokai, Maui and Kauai.
"We are committed to determining the extent of the infestation and working with the industry and partners in containing and controlling the infestation and determining the source of the infestation," said Scott Enright, chairman of the state Board of Agriculture.
The coffee fields were first planted in 1996 after the closure of the sugar plantation at Waialua. An independent farm abandoned the coffee fields, and Dole Food assumed the operation in 2004.
Oishi said researchers are continuing to look for ways to control the pest and plan to take a trip to Brazil in January to see how farmers there control infestations.
The coffee berry borer, or Hypothenemus hampei, is native to Central Africa and found in numerous coffee-growing regions around the world, including South America.
Tom Greenwell, president of Greenwell Farms on Hawaii island, said the presence of the coffee berry borer has affected the company in various ways.
"You’ve got to be more vigilant," Greenwell said, adding that the farm uses fungus spray and a crop pruning rotation method that deprives the pest of food.
Greenwell said controlling the coffee berry borer has required more work and added an estimated $1.50 for a pound of coffee to its cost.
"There is no magic bullet," he said.
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