By Robert Andre Emmanuel
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The Ministry of Agriculture has unveiled a five-year plan to more than double the sector’s contribution to Antigua and Barbuda’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) through targeted development of key agricultural commodities and infrastructure improvements.
During a press conference at the Multipurpose Cultural Centre yesterday, Agriculture Minister Anthony Smith Jr announced the ministry’s goal to increase agriculture’s GDP contribution from its current 2 percent, valued at $116 million, to 5 percent.
“From a government standpoint, as we continue to see the import bill, our high import bill, we find it very important that we strengthen our agriculture sector where we can be in a position to reduce our import bill as well as to have the agriculture sector contribute much more to our GDP.
“From a ministry standpoint, we have to ensure that we continue to build out the infrastructure to strengthen our food security,” Smith stated.
Permanent Secretary Walter Christopher explained that achieving this goal would require focused development of 10 key commodities: pineapples, sweet potatoes, yams, cassavas, sweet peppers, honey, broilers, eggs, pork and goat meat.
Christopher explained that the ministry will provide targeted interventions including “incentives, assistance, extension outreach, and land assistance” for farmers who are producing these priority crops and livestock.
The plan includes several major infrastructure initiatives to support agricultural growth, including the development of strategic dams for reliable water access and improvement of feeder roads using the ministry’s own quarry.
“Farmers must be able to access their farms and, outside of going there to work and plant, farmers must be able to transport their food from their farm to the different markets,” Smith emphasized, adding that the ministry has secured an $800,000 grant from the CDF for heavy equipment to support these infrastructural developments.
Addressing the aging farmer population — as the average age of a farmer is over 50 years old — remains a key challenge, with Minister Smith noting the importance of relaunching the Antigua and Barbuda Youth in Agriculture Forum (ABAFY) and plans to establish a new School of Agriculture in Bethesda.
“We have an issue where the average population of our farmer is 50 plus years old … so we see the risk of where we have a generational gap of our farmers approaching retirement while we don’t have a lot of young farmers coming in behind them,” Smith explained.
The ministry also plans to establish a new state-of-the-art Central Marketing Corporation (CMC) facility to enhance market access for local farmers; however, that location is yet to be announced.
“What we really want to do is we want to use that location especially to really bring our local produce up for sale for people to be able to purchase.
“We’ll be focused heavily on customer service and again just really promoting our local farmers with our new state-of-the-art CMC location,” Smith explained, adding that negotiations are still ongoing.
The comprehensive plan also includes initiatives to develop feed production capabilities through a recently signed preliminary agreement for 25,000 acres in Venezuela, which could help reduce production costs for local livestock farmers.
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