Dear Editor,
Reference is made to editorial “Caribbean Week of Agriculture” (Nov 1). It is rather curious that an agriculture forum is held in a tourism haven that hardly produces food. Is the Bahamas archipelago the right place for a conference on boosting food production and food security? Was the purpose to focus attention that territories that don’t produce much food should re-orient its economy towards sustainable development especially in the area of food production? Was the objective achieved? There needs to be an assessment by the sponsors and organizers in order to guide agro productivity.
The theme of the five days forum was on food security. As noted, some 57% of the Caribbean region face food insecurity. Bahamas imports nearly all of its food and very little intra-regionally. Bahamas is a high income nation with a population of less than half a million. Bahamas does not face food insecurity in that it has foreign reserves to import foods although it does not grow much food. Its population are high income to afford imported foods unlike the rest of the independent territories of the region. The rest of the region can hardly afford imported foods and rely on domestic agricultural produce for sustenance.
An examination of Bahamas economic sectors reveals that over 50% of its GDP is based on tourism and 15% on banking service. Agriculture and manufacturing account for less than 7% of GDP. Bahamas imports almost all of its food, yes including citrus, vegetables, fruits (bananas and mangoes included). Very few crops are grown in Bahamas; over 70% of its food come from the USA. These numbers cause me to return to the question raised earlier on suitability of Bahamas on a conference on agriculture! Wouldn’t Guyana, Trinidad, Surinam, Jamaica not have been more suited for such a forum? Guyana and Jamaica are making serious efforts to produce more foods. Other territories should follow suit.
The need of the hour is for every territory to grow more food to meet as much domestic demands as possible. That would help to ensure food security. At one time, most of the territories were exporters of produce. Now, almost all of them are importers of food that used to grow domestically. There is no justifiable reason why vegetables (including greens used in salads) can’t be grown locally with government support in each territory to meet domestic consumption. Governments should encourage kitchen gardens. One will be surprised how much can be produced in small spaces or even in buckets with soil.
In NY and other American locations, for example, Guyanese, Trini, and Jamaican homeowners grow several vegetables in four or five warm months that meet their needs for most of the year and that they also share with families and neighbours. In Aruba, a desert, Guyanese and Filipinos grow a lot of their own foods in their small yards or in buckets. The best guarantee for food security is for every family in Guyana and rest of the region to grow as much as possible to meet basic needs.
Sincerely,
Vishnu Bisram