Green: Use technology to boost farming sector on a global scale

WESTERN BUREAU:

Floyd Green, minister without Portfolio in the Office of the Prime Minister, is urging veteran farmers and students seeking to enter the agricultural sector to find ways of using modern technology in the industry to make farming a productive vocation on a national and global scale.

Green, who is a former minister of agriculture, made the call on Thursday while addressing the official opening of the Elim agro-processing plant near Braes River, St Elizabeth. The plant, located near the Sydney Pagon STEM Academy, was constructed over a three-month period, between June and September 2021, at a cost of $47 million by the JWN Foundation.

“If you really focus on transforming lives and bettering communities, then linking agriculture, education, and technology is the way to go. We cannot think of agriculture as we used to 20 years ago, as those days are gone,” said Green.

“I want our students, our community members, when they use this facility, to think about developing products that the world will want, and to think about how you are going to ensure that you not only develop the product, but you also have your website, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok, that is telling the world you have the best breadfruit chips anywhere,” Green added.

According to the minister, Jamaica has significant potential to capitalise on the sale of various local products on the world market, to include items like ackee, yam, and locally made sauces.

SECOND BIGGEST AGRICULTURAL EXPORT

“Jamaica’s second biggest agricultural export is sauces, which made US$27 million last year. We made US$35 million from yam, and US$30 million from ackee, so the potential is limitless,” Green explained.

“We are still not making enough from breadfruit, we are nowhere near making enough from cassava, and the demand we have for turmeric is through the roof. All of these things we are speaking of are things we can grow right here, but I want that when you grow it, you are thinking of how to digitise what you do to supply the world.”

Green’s call is an echo of a similar recommendation he made in July 2021, when he urged farmers to utilise more climate-smart technology and practices so as to minimise crop loss from more frequent and extreme weather conditions.

Prior to that, former ICT lecturer at the Northern Caribbean University, Henry Osborne, indicated in 2019 that if technology were to be correctly infused into farming practices, more produce would be available in markets and there could be an increase in food exports.

In the meantime, Green noted that the Government is targeting more agro-processing facilities like the Elim plant to be built in specified areas across St Elizabeth.

“St Elizabeth is a big parish with a number of distinct agricultural zones, and oftentimes the challenge that you have is that even if there is a storage and processing facility, the distance from the farmers makes it too expensive for them to truly be able to utilise it. Part of our vision for St Elizabeth is to ensure that we have facilities of this nature in key locations that will reduce the transportation cost to our farmers and that will give them access to the storage and agro-processing they need to maximise the return on their investment,” said Green.

christopher.thomas@gleanerjm.com