Disease again threatens Big Island papaya industry

By Hugh Clark
Advertiser Big Island Bureau

PAHOA, Hawai'i — The papaya industry on the Big Island, which produces 96 percent of the state's commercial crop, is under threat again from the destructive ringspot virus.

There is no treatment against the virus, which is spread by a tiny aphid. The disease is reinfecting many orchards in Puna, with the worst problem in Kapoho and 'Opihikao.

Delan Perry, a farmer who heads the economic subcommittee of the Papaya Advisory Committee, reports that more than 1,000 acres representing an estimated field value of $3 million are being threatened by the reinfestation of the pest that almost wiped out the industry in the 1990s.

"It never left us, and I suspect it never will," Perry said.

If farmers respond to the new threat by destroying plants that are infected, as well as healthy plants near them, the problem could be greatly lessened, he said.

Growers, however, are reluctant to kill plants that appear healthy after months of tender care and costly fertilizer feedings, according to Perry and state plant quarantine chief Myron Isherwood Jr.

Isherwood, a Big Island native, and others blame the current problem on damp weather in Puna, despite the fact that rainfall totals in East Hawai'i are more than 70 percent below normal.

The state has destroyed 600 acres of abandoned and diseased plants on state-owned land, but it has not gone onto private land to destroy papaya plantings.

In a single-page plea from Perry being distributed to growers on behalf of the Papaya Advisory Committee, farmers are urged to destroy their plants within 48 hours of detection of the ringspot virus. The committee, the main arm of the industry, was established under a federal government marketing order.

"You have to cut one to save a hundred," said Perry in the letter. "One of the hardest things I have had to do is cut a strong-looking, young papaya tree with a 4-foot fruit column." But any delay in destroying the plant could spread the virus to 100 other trees, he said.

Other growers, including William Julian, are urging compliance. "I am seeing an alarming spread of the virus. Last month I had to cut 200 trees" worth about $5 each, he said.

"We're looking at the horror of 1994 all over again," said Reuben Kay, who farms 40 acres near Kapoho. "Many of us went out business."

One of the biggest problems, according to Isherwood, is that there are 400 commercial farmers but just 30 or so who show up for industry meetings, leaving the others to rely on hearsay.