RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Al­ready fac­ing fer­til­iz­er and chem­i­cal short­ages and a spike in feed and food prices, lo­cal farm­ers have start­ed go­ing back to tra­di­tion­al farm­ing meth­ods util­is­ing an­i­mal ma­nure, com­post stocks and in­ter-crop­ping farm­ing tech­niques to pro­duce food for the na­tion.

But with a food cri­sis loom­ing, farmer Rish­ma Lal­har­ry be­lieves the new Min­is­ter of Agri­cul­ture, Kaz­im Ho­sein, must im­me­di­ate­ly ad­dress is­sues fac­ing the farm­ing com­mu­ni­ty in­clud­ing prae­di­al lar­ce­ny, land tenure, fer­til­iz­er and chem­i­cal short­ages, the in­va­sion of the Gi­ant African snails, lo­custs, no prop­er util­i­ties and mar­ket sup­port sys­tems for farm­ers.

"We need the min­is­ter to be on the ground work­ing with farm­ers," Lal­har­ry said. "Gi­ant African snails have tak­en over our area mak­ing it dif­fi­cult. We have to buy chem­i­cals and baits to help but this is cost­ly. We want the min­istry to take charge of this now."

The fer­til­iz­ers in short sup­ply in­clude the fol­low­ing:

* Elix­er Zor­ka brand which is the lead­ing pro­duc­er of com­plex min­er­al fer­til­iz­ers in South­east Eu­rope, name­ly Elix­er Supreme NPK–12:12:17 (SOP); 16:27:7; 12:11:18+trace el­e­ments and 7:20:30

*A cheap­er line of fer­til­iz­ers from Eu­roChem Agro–12:12:17+2 a Fo­liar fer­til­iz­er: Mag­ic Gro–12:30:15; 20:20:20; and 10:52:10

*Sikal Fert Fer­til­iz­ers

*No­vaT­e­ch® - 12:12:17 (+2+TE) Com­po Ex­pert 

*Yara­Green–12:11:18+2; 12:24:12 and Ni­tro­bor

* Fer­san Fer­til­iz­er–12:24:12; Muri­ate of potash

*Am­mo­ni­um sul­phate

Workers reap peppers at Caribbean Earth Friendly Farms in Williamsville.

Some farm­ers have al­so been re­port­ed to be cre­at­ing their own blends, which is not the best prac­tice.  

 With fer­til­iz­ers in short sup­ply, Lal­har­ry said farm­ers have al­so re­sort­ed to tra­di­tion­al in­ter-crop­ping and al­ter­na­tive fer­til­iz­ers.

"A crop like peas has ni­tro­gen-fix­ing bac­te­ria in the root nodes so it adds ni­tro­gen to the soil. Plant­i­ng a leaf crop eg let­tuce, pak­choi, cab­bage, shadon beni would ben­e­fit from the ni­tro­gen rich soil and not need fer­til­iz­ers," she ex­plained.

An­oth­er farmer Ram­sumair Hanu­man said the farm­ing com­mu­ni­ty at Sec­ond Co­r­i­al, Palmyra, pro­duces an abun­dance of food but since fer­til­iz­ers and pes­ti­cides be­came scarce, farm­ers have been strug­gling. Hanu­man us­es goat ma­nure in his fields.

Mean­while, a re­search team from the Fac­ul­ty of Food & Agri­cul­ture (FFA) at The Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies, St Au­gus­tine, is cur­rent­ly es­tab­lish­ing a com­post­ing fa­cil­i­ty at the Uni­ver­si­ty Field Sta­tion for com­mer­cial pro­duc­tion of ver­mi­com­post. This could mean re­duced re­liance on syn­thet­ic fer­tilis­ers.

To com­pound the sit­u­a­tion farm­ers face, thieves have of­ten raid­ed fields, burn­ing down gar­den sheds and steal­ing tools.

"Some­times I think it doesn't make sense any­more. What you in­vest in­to a crop you nev­er get the re­turns," he said.

 At the Cun­jal Food­crop Project, over 100 farm­ers from the Cun­jal Food­crop Project who cul­ti­vate over 300 acres of land at Cu­mo­to South Trace, Rochard Dou­glas Trace, Bar­rack­pore, have been bat­tling with GA snails.

Dean of the Faculty of Food & Agriculture (FFA) at The University of the West Indies, St Augustine, Dr Mark Wuddivira.

UWI wants a re­gion­al food plan...take back un­used leased lands and give to se­ri­ous pro­duc­ers

The Dean of the FFA at The Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies, St Au­gus­tine, Dr Mark Wud­di­vi­ra said that the FFA was al­so en­gaged in sev­er­al re­search and de­vel­op­ment projects that can ad­dress many of the chal­lenges fac­ing pro­duc­ers in T&T.

"Dr Gaius Eu­dox­ie and his re­search team are cur­rent­ly es­tab­lish­ing a com­post­ing fa­cil­i­ty at the Uni­ver­si­ty Field Sta­tion for com­mer­cial pro­duc­tion of ver­mi­com­post. This could mean re­duced re­liance on syn­thet­ic fer­tilis­ers," he ex­plained.

"Prof Du­raisamy Sar­a­vanaku­mar’s AIMS project de­vel­oped a line of bio-con­trol agents and bio-fer­til­iz­ers for im­proved plant dis­ease and soil fer­til­i­ty man­age­ment to re­duce the use of haz­ardous agro­chem­i­cals, harm­ful to the en­vi­ron­ment."

Re­search is cur­rent­ly be­ing con­duct­ed by Rakesh Bhukal on neo-trop­i­cal aquat­ic species to be used as food as well as in­sect farm­ing for feed al­ter­na­tives. 

Dr Wud­di­vi­ra al­so said the "FFA con­tin­ues to re­search im­proved sys­tem ap­proach­es for in­creas­ing pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, min­imis­ing en­vi­ron­men­tal pol­lu­tion and build­ing re­silience to cli­mate change."

Dr Wud­di­vi­ra al­so said Dr Oral Da­ley and Dr Afiya John are col­lab­o­ra­tive­ly work­ing on bread­fruit and oth­er tree crops as foods with po­ten­tial for flour pro­duc­tion. 

"Dr Ronald Roop­nar­ine is work­ing on wa­ter re­source man­age­ment for build­ing ef­fi­cient wa­ter and ir­ri­ga­tion sys­tems for plants, and Dr Wendy-Ann Isaac has been en­gaged in seed sav­ing ex­er­cis­es of open-pol­li­nat­ed, non-GMO seeds as well as com­mer­cial pro­duc­tion of two unique va­ri­eties of corn de­vel­oped at the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies, UW-7 Sweet corn and IC­TA farm corn." Dr Wud­di­vi­ra not­ed that these will be avail­able for sale to pro­duc­ers in Trinidad and the re­gion.  

"The FFA is work­ing to­geth­er with re­gion­al and na­tion­al de­vel­op­men­tal part­ners to eval­u­ate al­ter­na­tives to feed im­ports. The FFA is co-chair of the Re­search and Hu­man Re­source The­mat­ic Group (of CARI­COM), which is dis­cussing the train­ing and ca­pac­i­ty needs of the re­gion in im­ple­ment­ing the 25 by 25 mis­sion."

 He agrees that a re­gion­al ac­tion plan is need­ed now to deal with the im­pend­ing food cri­sis. 

And he said The UWI's FFA was do­ing what it can to pre­vent the loom­ing food cri­sis.

"At the FFA, we con­tin­ue to of­fer short cours­es to pro­duc­ers and back­yard gar­den prac­ti­tion­ers in sus­tain­able back­yard gar­den­ing, non-tra­di­tion­al pro­duc­tion sys­tems such as hy­dro­pon­ics and aquapon­ics, val­ue-ad­di­tion for food and nu­tri­tion se­cu­ri­ty, sus­tain­able crop pro­tec­tion prac­tices, waste man­age­ment, com­post­ing, and plant quar­an­tine, all aimed at prepar­ing our peo­ple to be re­source­ful and re­silient to face the food/feed cri­sis."

Dr Wud­di­vi­ra al­so has some ad­vice for the new min­is­ter. He wants the min­is­ter to take back un­used lands leased to farm­ers and re­dis­trib­ute them to se­ri­ous pro­duc­ers, in­clud­ing UWI and UTT agri­cul­ture grad­u­ates.

Dr Wud­di­vi­ra said the en­tire Caribbean re­gion was fac­ing a mas­sive food and nu­tri­tion cri­sis and the on­ly way to sur­vive is to have a co­or­di­nat­ed re­gion­al food plan in which more sup­port is giv­en to pro­duc­tive farm­ers.

"Cli­mate change, food in­se­cu­ri­ty, the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic re­stric­tions, the de­cline in re­gion­al in­dus­tries and the cur­rent Ukraine/Rus­sia con­flict can on­ly be ef­fec­tive­ly ad­dressed by co­or­di­nat­ed re­gion­al re­spons­es. With the prob­lems be­com­ing in­creas­ing­ly acute, fail­ure to co­op­er­ate de­ci­sive­ly and co­her­ent­ly will re­sult in mas­sive threats to re­gion­al food and nu­tri­tion se­cu­ri­ty," he added.

"Co­or­di­nat­ed ef­forts through CARI­COM can help in strate­gi­cal­ly po­si­tion­ing the larg­er Caribbean states to serve as pro­duc­ers of feed to re­place ex­tra-re­gion­al im­ports."

Darius Dukhegin-Lalla, right, works together with his wife Katherine Subero, left, and an employee at his farm in Felicity, Chaguanas last February.

'Farm­ers de­mo­ti­vat­ed'

Agri­cul­ture econ­o­mist Omar­dath Ma­haraj said farm­ers are de­mo­ti­vat­ed as they face dif­fi­cul­ties with land prepa­ra­tion, equip­ment and ma­chin­ery prob­lems, seed short­ages and de­plorable road in­fra­struc­ture.

"Leav­ing agri­cul­ture sole­ly as farm­ers' re­spon­si­bil­i­ty is un­ten­able," he added. He called on the min­is­ter to in­vest in the bread­fruit ini­tia­tive where the crop could be plant­ed through­out T&T so that when hard times hit, peo­ple will still have ac­cess to food.

But agron­o­mist Akanath Singh said that de­spite the wor­ri­some trends, there was still hope for T&T as long as Min­is­ter Ho­sein acts now.

 He wants Ho­sein to pro­vide train­ing for farm­ers in al­ter­na­tive fer­til­iz­er tech­niques, pro­vide land for agri­cul­ture grad­u­ates, pro­vide in­cen­tives for home gar­den­ing, en­cour­age com­mu­ni­ty gar­den­ing pro­grammes and re-in­vest­ments in mega-farms. He al­so wants Ca­roni Green to be re­opened and more agri­cul­tur­al ex­ten­sion of­fi­cers to be hired.

"There are hun­dreds of grad­u­ates from ECI­AF and UWI who are seek­ing em­ploy­ment. This year makes it 17 years I am wait­ing to be re­cruit­ed as an agri­cul­tur­al ex­ten­sion of­fi­cer in the Min­istry of Agri­cul­ture. The min­istry is se­vere­ly un­der­staffed; some of­fi­cers have to over­see two dis­tricts due to the staff short­age," he added.

Singh said that if train­ing was pro­vid­ed to farm­ers, there would be more pro­duc­tiv­i­ty. He not­ed that hy­dro­pon­ics has ex­pand­ed and more youths are ex­per­i­ment­ing with NFT Sys­tems, Ver­ti­cal Sys­tems, and Drip to Waste Sys­tems which re­quire less land. 

"If we are to im­prove the agri­cul­tur­al sec­tor, we need to work on solv­ing the chal­lenges hy­dro­pon­ic farm­ers face, a ma­jor one be­ing land avail­abil­i­ty. A lot of these farm­ers are new to agri­cul­ture and are set­ting up sys­tems at their homes, dri­ve­ways, back­yards, and rooftops and it is dif­fi­cult to know we have avail­able land that isn’t be­ing used at all," Singh added.

Min­is­ter to meet with stake­hold­ers to dis­cuss prob­lems

Ho­sein, who re­cent­ly took up his new po­si­tion, said there was a lot of work to be done in his new min­istry. He said meet­ings will be arranged with stake­hold­ers to dis­cuss prob­lems.

Ho­sein said, "At present, there is an ur­gency to in­crease seed va­ri­eties stored and of­fered by the Na­tion­al Seed Bank through the Min­istry’s Re­search Di­vi­sion. The in­tro­duc­tion of nine-grain green pi­geon peas, lo­cal cu­cum­bers, gin­ger, and ad­di­tion­al va­ri­eties of sweet pota­toes and cas­sa­va and yam cul­ti­vars. Fur­ther­more, the min­istry will al­so be es­tab­lish­ing an ad­di­tion­al 20 acres at the Na­tion­al Seed Bank to sup­port this ini­tia­tive."

Asked what is be­ing done to al­le­vi­ate the food/feed cri­sis, Ho­sein said: "The Na­tion­al Agri­cul­tur­al Mar­ket­ing and De­vel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion (NAMDE­V­CO) con­tin­ues to de­vel­op and sus­tain mar­ket link­ages for farm­ers for both the com­mer­cial and re­tail sec­tor. Such pro­grammes en­sure that pro­duc­tion is con­tin­u­ous and the avail­abil­i­ty of raw ma­te­ri­als for val­ue-added pro­cess­ing and di­rect sales to con­sumers ei­ther through the Farm­ers Mar­kets es­tab­lish­ments, re­tail mar­kets and whole­sale mar­kets are avail­able at all times."

Ho­sein said, "The abil­i­ty of NAMDE­V­CO to keep mar­ket op­er­a­tions safe and con­sis­tent through­out the pan­dem­ic as well as the as­sur­ance of safe qual­i­ty foods through on­go­ing mon­i­tor­ing and ca­pac­i­ty build­ing pro­grammes such as the in­tro­duc­tion of the Good Agri­cul­tur­al Prac­tice (GAP) Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion pro­gramme and in­creased mar­ket op­por­tu­ni­ties al­so fur­ther sup­port­ed sus­tain­able pro­duc­tion in the field."  

The min­is­ter re­vealed that for Feb­ru­ary, NAMDE­V­CO was able to gath­er pro­duc­tion da­ta from 649 farm­ers com­pris­ing 898 plots of land to­talling 2,130 acres of land all un­der pro­duc­tion with a pro­ject­ed yield of 9,313,670 kilo­grams per month for the next three months.

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