Sustainable agriculture in the Caribbean received a boost with the establishment of a C$20 million Canadian government-funded project in several Caribbean states specifically designed to benefit disadvantaged persons.
The Ministry of Agriculture in a release yesterday informed that the World University Service of Canada (WUSC) had hosted a virtual launch of its five-year Sustainable Agriculture in the Caribbean (SAC) project. It stands to benefit some 12,000 women, youth (both female and male), and marginalised men in five Caribbean countries, namely Guyana, Jamaica, Suriname, Dominica and St. Lucia.
Beneficiaries of the programme which is being funded by the Government of Canada through Global Affairs Canada (GAC) to the tune of CA$20 million, “will be exposed to an agricultural project that will increase their impact on agricultural markets in the Caribbean while developing more environmentally sustainable and climate-resilient domestic agricultural markets for economic growth.”
WUSC is a Canadian non-profit organisation which works in over 15 countries around the world to improve education, economic, and empowerment opportunities for young people. Minister of Agriculture, Zulfikar Mustapha, in his address at the launch ceremony stated that the need to increase opportunities and capacity for women and youths in various agricultural market systems were goals that are linked to the ministry’s vision while stressing that the private sector also has a role to play as enablers in the system.
“The need to invest in agriculture, could not be clearer. As such, Guyana is pleased to be joining our sister CARICOM countries Jamaica, Suriname, Dominica, and St. Lucia in this project. The need to increase livelihoods, opportunities, and capacity for women and youths to participate in inclusive, sustainable, and climate-resilient agricultural market systems are goals that are linked with the ministry’s vision of having a competitive, dynamic, and diversified socially inclusive and environmentally sustainable agri-food system. The Government of Guyana aims to help farmers grow more, be better connected to markets, thereby earning more and living better lives. At the same time, the private sector has a role to play as enablers in this system to increase their productivity, improve the quality of their production and their reliability as suppliers, and help build strong producer organizations to access the markets,” Mustapha was quoted as saying. According to the release, the SAC project was designed to facilitate linkages between key market actors, strengthen their capacity through training, information-sharing, and outreaches, and foster climate-resilient approaches at every stage and via a wide range of key market actors in the agricultural market system. This approach, it said, is expected to help increase productivity and profitability in the agricultural sector, mitigate the impacts of climate change, reduce the Region’s vulnerability to natural disasters, and foster climate-resilient agricultural markets that offer increased equitable, inclusive, and sustainable economic benefits for women and youth.
Canadian High Commissioner to Guyana, Mark Berman spoke about the urgent need to “build back better” as Guyana’s agriculture sector charts a path to recovery given the challenges brought on by the countrywide impacts of this year’s May-June flood coupled with the ongoing global pandemic and issues of climate change.
“The launch of the SAC Project is particularly timely as we consider the challenge Guyana’s food production system faced in 2021 with the countrywide impact of the May to June 2021 flood (coupled) with the ongoing global pandemic and the issues of climate change. As the sector charts a path to recovery and resilience, there is an urgent need to ‘build back better’. Building back better requires a transformative agenda that involves making food production more diverse or sustainable, more efficient, and more inclusive. Inclusion of women and especially Guyana’s indigenous communities are essential across many rural farming communities of Guyana, women are well-known producers of cash crops or vegetables, not only to feed their households but also to supply traders and markets,” Berman said.
The SAC projects also aim to pursue environmental sustainability in relation to Guyana’s commitment to carbon emissions and mitigation, pursue climate resilience and adopt climate-smart agricultural practices.
It is expected that by the end of the programme lifecycle, there will be increased equitable participation of women and youth in agricultural markets, the release added.
