MINISTER of Agriculture Dr. David Estwick has a vision for the agricultural sector, which will see increased crop production and reduced levels of importation of produce that are being grown locally.
In fact, during a recent launch of the new Integrated Knowledge Management System, the Minister revealed that on the heels of this new ICT project, steps are on the way to enhance the power of the Barbados Agricultural Development Marketing Corporation to achieve this goal.
“We will be asking the Cabinet to approve that a number of products that we now import into this country, that we have the capacity to produce locally, that those products be brought under the BADMC’s management and BADMC becomes the sole importer of those products and they would only be imported when there are net deficits that cannot be produced locally.”
According to the Minister “...We don’t want to distort the market, but we believe strongly that in order to help our domestic farmers to enhance their capacity to produce the product, we have to give them some breathing space to allow them to enhance that capacity and the operation by going to Cabinet and asking Cabinet to bring it under the BADMC a lot of products that we can produce locally.”
These items include lettuce, carrots, tomatoes, onions, sweet peppers, pumpkins and squash, sweet potatoes to name a few, pointing out that some vegetables such as broccoli, which cannot be grown locally, would not be on the list.
In order to solidify linkages between the agricultural, manufacturing and hotel sectors, he said the island must reach the point where production capacity and marketing are enhanced. “We are confident our two systems under this Knowledge Management System are going to allow the agriculture sector to pay a much more effective role in national development,” he said, adding that the Cabinet paper has already been prepared.
This new ICT platform he said, would give planners, buyers and sellers in a web-based forum, an indication of available volumes of produce and provide forecasting for local production. “The new system is intended to enhance the interconnectivity of the stakeholders in the area of agriculture so that the supply and demand side would be effectively integrated in a real-time ICT platform.”
The Minister also outlined plans to establish the capacity to grade products locally. “Once we have the capacity to grade products it allows the manufacturing sector, and hotel sector that require a sustained quality of product and quantity of product to be realised. That situation will allow for the farmer to have his particular product brought to the BADMC, for a nominal administrative fee and that would be graded and packaged to the particular consumer, whether hotel, supermarket chain or private house,” he explained. (JH)