By Vanessa James
KINGSTON, Jamaica, (JIS) – Minister of agriculture, fisheries and mining, Floyd Green, says the government is repositioning the agricultural sector to bounce back faster and stronger from future extreme weather-related events.
“Every time we go through a major weather event, we must not aim to just recover; we must aim to do it quicker and better than the time before,” said minister Green delivering the main address at the Recovery and Investment Forum hosted by the Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA) at the Ministry’s Playing Field at Hope Gardens in St Andrew, April 28.
The event, held as part of Farmers’ Month celebrations in April, included the official handover of agricultural equipment and machinery by the ministry to RADA, which will provide long-term support for farmers.
The list of machinery includes four rubber wheel tractors; two backhoes; harvesters for potato and onion farmers; 12 walk-behind tractors, which will be sent to high production zones for communal use; 12 soil augers; three-disk ploughs; rotovator; seed planter; and four agricultural drones.
Minister Green noted that while inputs such as fertiliser, seeds, agriculture chemicals and baby chicks were distributed to individual farmers in the aftermath of the hurricane, the provision of “a brand-new tractor can help multiple farmers over a longer period of time.”
The minister said that the machinery will help farmers manage their land amid the ongoing labour shortage, reducing the need for additional workers while boosting overall efficiency. RADA is being established as the avenue that farmers can go to “to get your fertiliser service, your pesticide application service, and you will come to rent the drone, and we will send a drone pilot”.
The agriculture minister informed that the drones being provided to the farmers are capable of capturing soil and crop data, which will enable more targeted interventions and prevent the over-allocation of resources.
“So, instead of using the fertiliser that you always use, where you might be spending a lot of money and wasting the resources, we can say to you, this is the nutrition regime that your plants need. These drones can pick up when plants are under stress, what is the deficiency, and then the extension officer can guide you as to what you should be putting in,”minister Green said.
In addition to exhibiting the machinery that has been acquired by the Ministry of Agriculture, farmers received financial information that can be used to expand their farms, implement better business planning and improve personal financial growth.
Meanwhile, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) at RADA, Garnet Edmondson, said that the Recovery and Investment Forum was important in helping farmers to adopt the elements of modern agriculture so that the industry can thrive.
“Agriculture must move beyond subsistence farming. It must move beyond survival. We are positioning you to become agribusiness operators, producers who understand markets, who invest wisely, and who grow sustainably,” Edmondson said.