Under the dynamic leadership of agriculture minister Christopher Tufton and response from the farming community to financial and technical assistance, the agricultural sector grew by 3.1 per cent in gross output for the first quarter of this year after the 12 per cent growth last year. In terms of domestic crop production, the momentum which has seen six consecutive quarters growth since 2008 to the end of 2009, though slowing, continued into the first quarter of 2010 with a 3.9 per cent increase.

The assistance included the Gustav programme funded by the USAID to the tune of $90 million, which is used to fund production and productivity, providing access to approved financial institutions to enable small farmers to have easier access to capital, providing a 20 per cent grant funding based on project cost and improved irrigation scheme.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries states that the performance was achieved despite the severe drought that gripped many of the more productive areas of the country last year. The drought mainly affected productivity. The effects of the drought were most pronounced in the south-central parishes. These conditions led to a fall-off in production and productivity in many crops as the quarter progressed.

Despite the severity of the drought in some of these areas, there were also many areas of the country where the effects of the drought were not as severe. Some key production areas in the north-eastern parishes as well as the hilly interior of the country did not suffer from as great an impact on production or productivity as the southern parishes. Also the longer-term crops such as yams and plantains were not affected as some of the short-term ones. The supply of yams, this writer can attest, was in surplus in Corporate Area markets. The result was that the price of yam decreased to $60 per pound in January, February, March and April this year as against $80 most of last year.

The ministry took a proactive approach to developing and expanding strategies that will encourage more sustainability of production in the face of natural disasters, including drought. To this year, several strategies were implemented that played a mitigating role in reducing the potential impact the drought conditions experienced during last year and into the first quarter this year. These included:

* The promotion of good agricultural practices, especially through the ministry’s

Production and Productivity Programme under which crops such as hot pepper

have been especially targeted by the ministry for production of value-added. In

addition, there has been resurgence in the production of Irish potato and carrots in

response to the deliberate policy of encouraging import substitution for key crops

that the country can competitively produce.

* Water conservation and improved irrigation efficiencies through the encouragement of the use of drip systems. For those areas without direct access to

irrigation schemes, these drip systems are integrated with the use of “black tanks”.

* The ministry has been actively encouraging increased production in those areas

that are served by irrigation schemes.

* Increases in the level of production and range of crops produced under protective

cultivation.

* Providing access to approved financial institutions so as to enable small farmers to have easier access to capital and providing a 20 per cent grant funding based on project cost.

* Financial assistance to farmers through the financial access for responsible

members (FARM) programme; Development of the “eat what you grow and grow what you eat” food security initiative and launch of the programme to encourage greater consumption of locally grown crops.

The number of extension officers have been increased to 70 which means that the number of extension areas can now be increased to ensure that an extension officer has fewer extension districts to cover, thereby positively impacting the level and quality of service being offered by the extension services.

The plans provide a heavy focusing on marketing which for many years has been a weak spot in agriculture. A marketing officer has been appointed in each parish to streamline the marketing efforts. Additionally, there will be closer collaboration between the ministry and RADA marketing. The intention is to create a seamless system and improved information flow and communication.

The ministry is sourcing local and international markets for farmers’ produce, creating a produce market organisation and providing farmers, agro-processors and traders real-time market intelligence on prices, supply and demand. A marketing information system is being created.

The toughest task with which the ministry is faced will be to decrease costs of production, processing and marketing for crop and livestock commodities and products by increasing yields and putting idle or underutilised land in production.