Hey Doc

[Wahalla]

I have always thought teh polticians in Jamaica spend too much effort into fire fighting not enough in stratigic thinking much less planning..

Today I recall a comment thatyou made vis a vis agriculture.... Ralston Hymen of Power 106 commented on the budget that the goverment should make make ministry of agriculture and energy a priority and give it as much importance as ministry of finance as these two areas will drain the budget..

And agriculture must be given stratigic thought....

I beleive in the past you have made a coment about stratigic irrigtion and was chased out of town... However given hte rise in food and energy prices that seems to have logical..

(To be honest I wish I had made the comments you made !)

[Dr.Dudd]

Re: Hey Doc

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Wahalla</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I have always thought teh polticians in Jamaica spend too much effort into fire fighting not enough in stratigic thinking much less planning..

Today I recall a comment thatyou made vis a vis agriculture.... Ralston Hymen of Power 106 commented on the budget that the goverment should make make ministry of agriculture and energy a priority and give it as much importance as ministry of finance as these two areas will drain the budget..

And agriculture must be given stratigic thought....

I beleive in the past you have made a coment about stratigic irrigtion and was chased out of town... However given hte rise in food and energy prices that seems to have logical..

(To be honest I wish I had made the comments you made !) </div></div> I would have been mobbed like a B'man if I couldn't run like they can too. [img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/704555_dwl.gif[/img]
That's the life of being unpopular in a Jamaican crowd.
[img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/70361-embarassed.gif[/img].
The feeling,because i cant call it an opinion,is that inless th epeople who they admire propose a policy,it can't be of any benefit. As a matter of fact,they probably think it is a damger to open their mind to diofferent opinions.

What they havent bother to study is the basis of every single successful country,is that they took agriculture seriously to create the support infrastructure when it was an important part of the value of their GDP.
Today they don't have to do that,because they have passed that stage,where it is of that importance.
If you notice the aspect of agriculture in Jamaica,that support the economy of the developed countries have the infrastructural support.
The rest of the sector that supply th edomestic economy survives by the whims of mother nature. When it floods,they suffer and 3 months after they are sufferung againg fron drought, because the government don't believe they the local people is important as the foreign ones they supply with the Sugar and banana.
The real reason behind this policy is to keep blacl Jamaicans so poor that they can't be bothered to see that they are being played as fools.
Jamaica has the ideal topography to create high elevation resovoirs that is replenished in the rainy seasons and,use gravity to power micro-hydro power stations while supplying the agricultural sector.
If this was ever taken seriously Jamaica will be much more economically secure than the oil rich countries,that will loose their edge with th egrowth of alternative energy as the primary energy source of the world.
I know that the majority do not have the abillity to understand my proposals, but I never expect the so called educated to be so obtuse.
As I have said many of my suggestion has been tried by the former administration, and until this one try some, the countty will be looking for a new administratioin in the short run.

On the other hand, If they do they wil have to do some serious treason to be removed from power.

[Dr.Dudd]

Re: Hey Doc

Gov’t to help banana and cane farmers cope with fertilizer increases
Tuesday, 04 March 2008
Help is coming for stakeholders in the sugar cane and banana sub-sectors who have been slapped with a 30 per cent increase in fertilizer prices.

In Parliament Tuesday, Agriculture Minister Dr. Christopher Tufton said alternative arrangements have been worked out to give some reprieve to farmers in these sectors.

"In the case of banana farmers they will benefit from the free supplies of fertilizer to be delivered within a week or a few weeks under the Hurricane Dean Rehabilitation Programme funded by the European Union Banana Support Programme," said Dr. Tufton.

"With respect to the sugar industry the ministry will provide an additional $25 million subsidy through the Jamaica Cane Farmers Product Sales Limited under an arrangement similar to what was executed under a $50 million programme,"

Dr. Tufton noted that Jamaica is concerned about the worldwide trend of escalation in fertilizer prices specifically as it related to raw materials.

Some of these have seen price increases from US$200 per ton last year, to US$237 per ton up to February 2008.

The minister also indicated that the price hikes are expected to continue for some time, but government is exploring other options in terms of sourcing cheaper supplies.

"The government is far advanced in examining cheaper raw materials from a number of sources but most encouragingly from Venezuela and we hope that based on these discussions that are currently taking place with Venezuela that we may be able beyond March to offer additional support by forcing relatively cheaper raw material for the mixing of the fertilizer," he continued.

http://www.radiojamaica.com/news

[Wahalla]

Re: Hey Doc

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">The rest of the sector that supply th edomestic economy survives by the whims of mother nature. When it floods,they suffer and 3 months after they are sufferung againg fron drought, because the government don't believe they the local people is important as the foreign ones they supply with the Sugar and banana.
</div></div>
i agree partially here.. I beleive that the sugar industry should be scrapped, ever since we had to import sugar to fullfill a EU quota...... We should be developing the Rum industry.. Higher values product... Not a low value product like sugar. Having said that the biofuel rush may make Jamaican sugar more competitive... I dont think Jamaica can develop a sugar bio-fuel (the import of sugar to make bio fuels for the US market is a seperate issue).. maybe if the process that converts the fiber/ carboyhydrate to a deisel comes to fuition.....

I grew up as a depending on the whim of agriculture.... And I beleive that small farmers are not effectively supported... New methods are not developed.... marketing, finance ect.. one pet hate of mine is that land is always available locally on an informal basis.... You can get a peice a land to farm from some one who owns it... literally for free... however no one has developed a standard short term contract that would protect the leasee and the leaser....

A comment made by a hotel owner that brought the ire of many on here I recall.. (I beleive he was called a rascist)...He made the comment that Jamaica agriculture is not geared towards the hotels.. there is not consistency of supply.. one week there is over supply, next week there is none... At the root of this comment is fact that a sophisticated market requeires security of supply.... Jamaicans farmers have not provided this.. We still depend too much on the technology and techiques of the 19th centuary..... There are exceptions to this...

[acceptedtoday]

Re: Hey Doc

Wahalla,
Some observations...

The term "small farmer" covers a hodge podge of varying types of farming spanning subsidence farming to capture farming to rainfed farming to mono cropping to slash and burn farming.

As such small farming is a political term more than a agribusiness term. Any displaced laborer with a machete can become a small farmer, such is the fertility of Jamaican soil any plot of land in the rainy season is a farm.

The question then "Is all farming methods viable and if so to what end and what market"?
Is market returns rural employment or food security the goal?

In Jamaica many treat farming by and large as the occupation of last resort.

Much of the hillside land in which "small" farming is carried out exception being (the Christiana potato farmers or the Warsop and surrounding area yam farmers, Yallas Valley and St James banana farmers) is more suitable for tree crops be it coffee, pimento, mangoes, citrus, and some aspects of horticulture where suitable micro-systems exist, than for crops which we want to fulfill import substitution through small farming enterprises.

This import substitution reasoning that so infuses our debates following any crisis of food scarcity or cost inflation that small rainfed plots of land should be the productive means to grow our own food (albeit the soil as I said earlier is fertile) is fanciful and need to be put to rest and rather be seen for what they are as a persistence of a cultural lifestyle of love of the land.

Unfortunately our largest rainfall areas are in the mountainous zones and our flat lands or land that lends itself to mecahisation and economies of scale do not all benefit from the flow through of year round rivers from these high rainfall areas.

To irrigate the vast acreage of the southern plains while the majority of surface water flows north to the sea also leads to competition with the need for domestic water supply. Can there be a balance between the needs of the tourism product, (eg waterfalls), and bring to bloom the southern plains with irrigation pipelines is an interesting trade off.

One pipeline will not be enough, it will mean tapping multiple sources.
The proposal to build dams in the mountains is not without problems. Much of our mountainous areas in filled with fracture lines and porous limestone, there will be a need to erect concrete catchments at high costs and the underlying rock structure, caves and accessibility will make the exercise costly maybe uneconomical.

Alternatively clays soils are not stable and large dams will cause slippage and dam breaks in the mountains could be an issue.

The Docs argument of an irrigated vegetable production needs to be examined with some caveats.
A system of small connected catchment dams, plastic lined as those currently in use by private hoticultural farms and a network or feeder pipelines from selected springs and rivers could be a solution but this will also increase the cost of production as the maintenance will have to be funded by water use to keep the system viable.

The choice of crops would be limited by the cost of the system. Could the farmers then compete without subsidies through import protection?