Region’s food import bill to feature at Caribbean Week of Agriculture

The Caribbean Week of Agriculture (CWA) returns to in-person format in The Bahamas this month at the Breezes Resort and Spa, Nassau, from October 9-13, where the region’s troubling food import bill will take centre stage under the theme ‘Accelerating Vision 25 by 2025’. This is in reference to the ambitious aim of reducing that bill by 25 per cent by 2025.

Acknowledging the critical importance of meeting this objective, Dionne Clarke-Harris, the Caribbean Agriculture Research and Development Institute’s (CARDI) representative for Jamaica, believes that a number of other issues must be addressed in order to make this a reality.

“The focus naturally is on reducing the region’s food import bill through ramping up production and productivity and one of the issues that must be addressed is the removal of non-tariff barriers to trade and making trade in the region much more seamless,” she told The Gleaner.

Pleased that the private sector is being called upon to become active, she expressed hope that the regional business community will lead the way in value-addition, and referenced an example of a popular import item.

“Chips is a very big import item and for Jamaica in particular, so the private sector would have to buy into the production of chips that could substitute for some of those imports.”

Clarke-Harris further identified areas for priority attention, among them affordable financing for farmers and digitisation of the sector.

She insisted that financing for farmers is especially important as extreme weather conditions continue to negatively impact their ability to bounce back after a drought or flood.

“That affects production and therefore the farmers’ livelihood, and ability to remain in farming is affected because he/she was not able to meet their financial commitments on the crop that they lost. So we have to look at the whole picture and try to address these gaps that are limiting our ability to reduce the food import bill.”

On the matter of the digitisation of the region’s agricultural sector, the CARDI executive says that needs to be addressed as a matter of urgency.

“We are still not embracing the e-solutions in agriculture, so I think that if we can start by treating with these issues in a meaningful way, it would really help to move the needle in a significant way,” she said.

MAJOR ISSUES

Meanwhile, a leading Caribbean agricultural professional has expressed disappointment in the pace of efforts at change. Dr H. Arlington Chesney in a 2022 article titled, ‘The implementation deficit and regional food import bill’, noted that while there had been a number of political pronouncements on the urgent need to reduce the region’s food import bill, little had been achieved. He attributed this to the failure of heads of government to achieve consensus, even though they all understood the need.

“The most renowned of these was in 2004,” he wrote, “when three senior regional professionals (including the author) supported then Guyana President, Bharrat Jagdeo, to prepare the Grand Anse ‘Framework for the repositioning of Caribbean agriculture’. In 2005, it was approved by Heads as the Jagdeo Initiative. The import bill in 2005 was US$1.64billion. It now approximates US$3.8 billion,” Dr Chesney noted. He highlighted nine of the major issues which have hurt regional unity and action over the decades.

“First – from the 1970s to now – vacillating focus for the development of regional agriculture between reduction of imports and foreign exchange earnings reacting to global influences, such as the financial meltdown and the Ukraine imbroglio.

“Second, inconsistent messaging by Heads on the importance of agriculture. Changing from being a “stand-alone item” to being subsumed in “economic development” on agendas of their meetings.

“Third, inadequate or inappropriate transmission of regional decisions to member states resulting in some key issues being unknown and/or misunderstood within national implementing ministries.”

Ironically, the ‘25 per cent by 2025’ document identifies agriculture as a major pillar of Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Member States economies which has the potential to build economic resilience and drive inclusive socio-economic development of the region, particularly given the current challenges being faced as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to that document, the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has indicated that global food trade has increased and will reach a record in both volume and value, marking a 14 per cent increase from 2020, an increase of beyond US$1.75 trillion in the global food import bill. Developing regions account for approximately 40 per cent of the total.