With numerous failed efforts at commercialization, the Ministry of Agriculture has embarked on another pilot project for onions here with lands on the Soesdyke Highway and at the National Agricultural Research and Extension Institute (NAREI) currently under cultivation.
In a brief comment, Agriculture Minister Zulfikar Mustapha related to Stabroek News that the trials are ongoing and 10 acres on the highway and at NAREI are part of the cultivation.
In addition to the large-scale trial, NAREI in a January Facebook post disclosed that it was partnering with 11 farmers from regions Two, Three, Four, Five, and Six, to conduct a trial cultivation of onions. The in-house trials saw 22 varieties of onions cultivated under shaded conditions.
In 2017, the World University Service of Canada (WUSC) through their pilot projects in several parts of Guyana concluded that the commodity was feasible for cultivation here.
A report from the Department of Public Information (DPI) had stated that the Mercedes variety was identified as being most suitable for large scale cultivation here. This variety, along with the others, was cultivated during three seasons of the year. DPI reported that the Mercedes variety yielded 56,444 kilogrammes per hectare (kg/ha) with its actual yield potential being 57,500 kg/ha.
Other findings during trials were that the onions which were cultivated have a longer (unrefrigerated) shelf-life of 80 to 100 days, seedlings which were grown under shaded conditions required special attention, heavy rainfall after transplanting could lead to more than 90 per cent mortality, pests and diseases were almost non-existent under shaded conditions, fertilizers should be applied at or near the surface because of the shallow root system, and in most cases, frequent irrigation can increase bulb size of the onion.
However, despite the success of trials which were a part of a Canadian-funded project to conduct onion cultivation, there has been no advancement or continuation of the crop.
According to 2017 statistics, Guyana’s annual consumption of onions is recorded at approximately 3,987 metric tonnes, costing the country foreign exchange expenditure of US$1,459,765.
PROPEL (Promotion of Regional Opportunities for Produce through Enterprises and Linkages) agronomist, Joanna Robertson, noted, “It is our hope to increase onion production in Guyana over a period of years…The long-term effect would be for us to gradually reduce the amounts of imports of onions in due time as production increases.”
These trials, in which NAREI collaborated were done along the Mahaica River, Kara-Kara, Amelia’s Ward, Affiance, Parika, Hopetown, and Benab, among other places.
