Why do Barbadians struggle to understand there should be a sense of urgency about eating and producing wholesome food? Did someone say food security. Did someone say a high incidence of NCD?
Minister Indar Weir and the ministers of agriculture talk up a storm but there is nothing of significance to show. Of late we can blame hot weather conditions. Is there still a threat from praedial larceny?
#foodfirst
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Just put the pot on and even though the rice is imported, I grew the field peas and pumpkin myself, and the chicken is Bajan “born.” When the hot food is cooked, I’ll slap half an avocado/pear longside. Happiness is a nice hot meal in a hungry belly.
The sweet potatoes and cassava are almost ready so in a week or two those things will be my complex carbohydrate.
I don’t know about commercial farmers who are trying to make a living, but for hobby farmers, giving away some of the produce may help to reduce predial larceny.
We never hear any complaints from the marijuana farmers about praedial larceny?
What is their secret?
Leviticus 23:22 “When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap to the edges of your field, nor gather the gleaning of your harvest; you are to leave them for the poor and for the stranger. I am the LORD your God.”
Their secret is that the plant is grown in protected areas AND they will shoot to kill or at minimum maim.
up front on the world stage in green.
I am reading that the incoming USA administration will be going after “Big Pharma” and “Big Food” but NOT after “Big Oil and Big Gas”
I first visited the USA in 1972. At that time Americans were regular sized people. When next I visited purely for recreation in 2012 [Disney] I was horrified to see how big Americans had become. I saw a young woman. maybe late thirties who because of her weight had difficulty standing and needed a wheel chair to move around, and she had to ask for an extra large wheel chair because as she said herself “my hips are too wide to sit in a standard sized chair.” The elementary aged son who was with her looked as though somebody had pumped him up. I wondered how they managed at home.
Sadly to tell the truth we Bajans seem to want to catch up with our American neighbors.
Will this administration be able to fix the American obesity epidemic. We will see.
EGG PRICES UPChickmont says shortage has made move necessary till year-end
THE PRICE OF EGGS is set to rise from today.
A letter from Barbados’ largest egg supplier, Chickmont, dated November 21, and signed by Trevor Gunby, Chickmont’s egg farm operations manager, outlined the reason for the increase, which the company said would be temporary.
“Due to a shortage of eggs created by our competitors, we have had to import [one] million eggs to satisfy local demand from now until December 31, 2024. The price of [the] imported eggs has landed here at 80 cents per egg. We have therefore had to make the decision to do a blended increase of [eight] cents per egg on your present price from the time mentioned. Unfortunately, this is the only solution we have for you, our valued customers.”
When contacted, chief executive officer of the Barbados Agricultural Society (BAS) James Paul said they were aware of the pending increase and while it was necessary at this time, he hoped it would be a one-off action and would not set a precedent.
“Because of the fact that right now, yes, we’ve seen a situation where egg stocks, egg inventories have dropped this year. COVID has caused a lot of people to come out of the industry and even the price compact itself did not address a lot of the concerns of the smaller producers.
“So, it meant that for some time now, we do know that egg production has not been where it should be. Some of our major stakeholders have not been producing at the level that they should be. So we supported the importation, at least at this point, in order to avoid any shortage of eggs. However, I want to note that we are seeing an increase in the placements of eggs and we are hoping that egg production should now start to increase by next year,” he said.
Paul said there was an expected increase in layer fowls coming for next year, which would result in an increase in local eggs. He also said he hoped this would mean there would be space for additional producers and greaterinvestment in the industry.
“Right now, there’s only one significant producer, which is Chickmont, so [additional producers] is something that would be welcomed in order to get more people involved and diversify earning opportunities. What I’m saying is that we want to get other players in, get more investment in the industry so that there will be other players who will also be producing eggs. And existing players, we want to encourage them to expand their production at the same time,” he said.
When asked his thoughts about the part of the letter in which Chickmont said that the shortage of eggs was created by their competitors, Paul said there was no room for finger-pointing.
“To be honest, I don’t think you can blame anybody as far as this is concerned. It is just a situation where the economy itself is what it is, and small producers made decisions based on the challenges that they were facing. We seem to forget that the whole question of the climatic conditions poses challenges to a lot of egg producers . . . so I would not go to the point of placing any blame.
“To me, this is not an opportunity to place blame, but it is an opportunity to recognise that there are investment opportunities. It also means that we have to look at the current technologies that are utilised by egg producers to see how we can help to improve them. And that is one of the things, using the $2 million fund which the Government created with the BAS, that we are going to see how we can address. So, I don’t think it’s a question of placing blame,” he said.
Paul also wished to note that importation was not a cure-all and did not automatically mean things would be cheaper. He urged the public to maintain faith in what was local.
“There is a seeming fervour on our part to feel that importation is the answer to everything in this country, rather than trying to ensure that we develop and enhance our productive sector. This shows that we need to place more confidence and more resources in our productive sectors if we want to guarantee food security, especially in agriculture.”
Source: Nation
Source: Nation
The blogmaster invites you to join the discussion.