Conspirasy

[Wahalla]

I dont know if I should laugh or cry.... who remembers the Mobay celebration where they removed the green from the flag....

Bertram wants Sangster airport renamed after former PNP minister

Bertram: Country needs to give more recognition to ‘Father Coombs’
BY MARK CUMMINGS Editor-at-Large Western Bureau [email protected]
Monday, October 21, 2013

MONTEGO BAY, St James — Political historian Arnold Bertram is calling for the Sangster International Airport in Montego Bay to be renamed in honour of Allan George Coombs, popularly known as 'Father Coombs,' who served as a minister of communications and works in a previous People's National Party Administration.
"In 1955, he became a minister... and both with the airport (Sangster International) and in the starting up of Negril he wasn't a bystander. He actively put forward for the development of Negril and for the airport, so I support it (for the airport to be named after him)," Bertram told the Jamaica Observer on Thursday, shortly after making a presentation at the inaugural Allan George St Claver Coombs Lecture at the University of the West Indies Western Jamaica Campus in Montego Bay.

Bertram wants Sangster airport renamed after former PNP minister 1/2

The airport was named after Sir Donald Sangster, who is Jamaica's second prime minister, serving from February 23, 1967 until the time of his death on April 11, 1967.
Sangster, a former member of the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), also served as minister of welfare and labour and finance minister. His face appears on the $100 banknote.
During his presentation on Thursday, Bertram, a local government minister under a former PNP administration, told the gathering that the country needs to give more recognition to Coombs, who he described as an outstanding son of Jamaica.
"This black man (Coombs) was the first to overcome the odds to get an islandwide trade union movement. But, he not only started the first island wide trade union in Jamaica, he transferred the base of politics from a few members of the professional classes to workers and labourers in Jamaica, and that is the legacy of Allan George St Claver Coombs," he argued.
Coombs died in 1969 at the age of 68.
He was later laid to rest in a pauper's grave, in the May Pen Cemetery, but his remains were re-interred at the Oaklawn Memorial Gardens on the outskirts of Mandeville in August.
And Member of Parliament for Central St James Lloyd B Smith, who also spoke at the lecture said, although two thoroughfares — St Claver's Avenue and Coombs Lane — are named after Coombs, more still needs to be done.
"As a Montegonian, I have always been one of those persons who have maintained an interest in the legacy of Allan George St Claver Coombs and we should begin the process of ensuring that Father Coombs, is even more substantially honoured. The airport across from here was developed during his time as minister of communications and works," Smith argued, adding that Coombs was "a man of the soil, who came from the bosom of the masses".
A founding member of the Bustamante Industrial Trade Union and the Jamaica Workers and Transport Union, Coombs was also a member of Parliament for North West St James under the PNP Administration.
Meanwhile, Outreach St James, a group aligned to the ruling PNP, has launched the 'Father Coombs Essay Competition' on the topic: 'Why did they call him Father? Was he a founding father of modern Jamaica?'
The competition is open to tertiary institutions islandwide.



Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/...#ixzz2iMrrJkLG

[Wahalla]

A good news story

and it is on agriculture..

hope it is sustainable

hope they added value to this raw material rather than simply sell..

and it is small potatos in terms of world production....

Cocoa production up

Monday, October 21, 2013

THE Cocoa Industry Board (CIB) is reporting an increase of more than 100 per cent in the production of cocoa for the 2011/2012 crop year.
Some 476.5 metric tonnes of cocoa, valued at $150.6 million, were produced during that crop year, as against the 2010/2011 crop year, which recorded 216.5 metric tonnes.

Some 476.5 metric tonnes of cocoa, valued at $150.6 million, were produced 1/1

Co-ordinator for Extension Services at the CIB, Dunstan Gaynor says the Board is committed to accelerating the growth of the cocoa industry, and in this regard, will undertake various initiatives to increase production.
Currently, an estimated 7,000 farmers are engaged in the farming of some 8,800 acres of cocoa across the island, with Clarendon recording the highest acreage.
The cocoa sector was given a boost in 2012, with the injection of ¤375,000 through the Rural Re-engineering Cocoa Rural Economy through Agro-processing, Eco-Tourism and Entrepreneurship (RECREATE) project.
Funding for the project was provided by the European Union (EU) early in the last decade when the World Trade Organisation (WTO) removed the preferential treatment for African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) bananas.
Ranked among the best exclusive producers of fine or flavoured cocoa by the International Cocoa Organisation (ICO), Jamaica presently exports cocoa to Japan, Switzerland, Holland, France and the United States of America.
According to Gaynor, the support of organisations such as the Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA), the Jamaica Agricultural Society (JAS) and the Jamaica 4-H Clubs is essential to the CIB achieving its target.
"The involvement of young people is also crucial to the sector. Each school with an on-going agricultural programme and adequate land will be assisted to set up a one-half to one acre of cocoa demonstration plot. Special attention will also be given to 4-H Clubs," Mr. Gaynor said.
He explained that 4-H centres with existing cocoa plots will be assisted to rehabilitate these plots and those without will be assisted to establish one-acre plots. Cocoa is grown in almost every parish, but the major cocoa producing parishes are Clarendon, St Mary, St Catherine, St Andrew and St Thomas.



Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/busin...#ixzz2iMsXkCLj