Huge potential in Guyana’s agri sector

Ensuring food security for the Caricom region is certainly one of the main challenges we face, considering the fact that the region’s food import bill is approximately US$4 billion annually, and this does not look as if it will change anytime soon.

Not so long ago, Trinidad and Tobago’s Food Production Minister, Vasant Bharath, had referred to this issue, stating: “We are importing most of what we can grow ourselves… We have to organise our individual farming sector and encourage young persons to embrace new technologies to see farming and agriculture as a business… In that way we are going to ensure food security for our people.”

Guyana has always placed great emphasis on its agriculture sector and, more particularly, on ensuring that the country is food secure. This emphasis has been expanded within the past decade or so to cope with the ever-increasing threat of global warming and changing weather patterns. These two natural phenomena have caused shock waves to resonate in countries around the world. In the 2008 global food crisis, we saw shortages of commodities with concomitant high prices being filtered down to Third World countries, especially those in the Caribbean, including Guyana. By mid-2008, international food prices had skyrocketed to their highest levels in 30 years. This, coupled with the global economic downturn, had pushed millions of people into poverty and deprivation. Whilst Guyana’s government moved quickly to put measures in place to cushion the effects of these shortages of commodities and their attendant high prices, most countries in the region had to weather the full impact, which had severely negative repercussions for their economies.

In Guyana, the Agriculture Ministry had launched the “Grow More” Food campaign, which sought to encourage persons to plant food for their own consumption and even for commercial purposes. The government, and by extension farmers, showed that they are very serious about providing enough locally-grown food at relatively cheap prices to satisfy the needs of the local population. There were also several instances when the government provided relief to farmers to get them operational again, after they had suffered losses caused by natural disasters etc.

The allocation of Gy$1.5 billion in this year’s budget towards the development and diversification of the agri sector is more evidence to show that the administration is committed to ensuring that Guyana can produce enough food at affordable prices to feed its people. It should also be mentioned that Gy$1.3 billion was spent last year to expand the non-traditional agricultural sectors of the country. Speaking at a recent public forum, Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) representative in Guyana, Dr Lystra Fletcher-Paul, noted that Guyana has shown its seriousness about agriculture and food production at a time when other countries are complacent regarding investments in these key sectors.

However, we must not be complacent, the local agriculture drive must continue. As citizens, we can also play more active roles: in addition to large-scale farming, some of us can become more involved by planting small kitchen gardens so that we do not have to buy everything.

To its credit, the government has been putting in place the necessary policy mechanisms to move the sector forward. It has also been very proactive in assisting farmers to find external markets for their produce, in order to earn foreign exchange. The world is facing a growing demand for food today, and our country must not be found wanting in responding to that need. Whilst we must continue to “Grow More” to satisfy local demand, all efforts must be made to create opportunities from the global food crisis by penetrating regional and international markets.