Agriculture Minister Zulfikar Mustapha today commissioned a state-of-the-art agro-processing facility at Fort Wellington, West Coast Berbice.
A release from the Ministry of Agriculture said that the $37 million investment will see approximately 700 persons including farmers, agro-processors, women, youth, and other stakeholders from Regions Five and Six benefiting from improved services geared at increasing the value and extending the shelf life of their products.
The release said that the facility is outfitted with the necessary equipment to process and package approximately 4,320 liters of green seasoning and 3,600 liters of pepper sauce monthly and is designed to offer 24-hour service as well as a mechanization process to reduce operating costs.
Mustapha challenged farmers to make full use of the facility and said that the government intends to ensure the agriculture sector develops its agro-processing capacity.
“Many times, the government may expend large sums of money to build new facilities but the farmers are not making full use of it. These facilities will help us to develop and modernize our agriculture sector. These initiatives are not new for this government because when you look at the plans, we have for the agriculture sector; the plans that were detailed in our manifesto, it stated that we have to move the sector from a primary productive sector to one with value-added capabilities. By the end of the year, we’ll see around nine facilities like this one being opened across the country,” the minister said.
