By K. C. Soares, ContributorI RECENTLY had the opportunity to have a close look at the document entitled "Medium Term Agricultural Production Plan 2002 - 2004" released by the Ministry of Agriculture. Apart from up-to-date statistical information, basically there is nothing new in the plan. We seem to be beating the same dead horses over and over and getting the same results - no progress.
How can a modern agricultural production plan not include the production of essential oils? Why should we continue to dump large sums of money in sugar cane, bananas, cocoa and other non-profitable traditional crops when there is increasing international demand for essential oils? In Jamaica many of these essential oil producing plants are grown in the wild, making it easy to propagate for commercial purposes.
These oils are used in perfumes, pharmaceuticals, food flavouring and more recently in what are termed bio-pesticides. Bio-pesticides are preferred to regular pesticides as they are more environmentally-friendly since they do not persist in the environment to create problems such as poisoning of water, thus killing fish and other living things in the food chain. Essential oils are also used in the treatment known as aromatherapy. There was absolutely nothing in this document on the production of essential oils. Even in the section on technology and research crops such as hot pepper, pumpkin, cassava, sweet potato and yam were mentioned for research and development while no mention was made of turmeric (wild ginger), rosemary, cloves, lemon grass, cinnamon, geranium, camphor and other plants producing sought after essential oils.
Instead of concentrating on this fast developing industry we are devising strategies to resurrect the sugar industry, the banana industry, the cocoa industry and the other traditional crops, which, year after year have been showing significant decline.
In the last five years, declines in banana and cocoa amounted to 52.7 per cent and 57.6 per cent respectively. Sugar-cane is definitely on its way out as production figures would suggest.
In 1965 we were producing 514,825 tonnes of sugar. In the year 2000 we could only produce 180,481 tonnes in spite of all the money being pumped into this industry.
Are we not wasting our time and money on these crops? How can we in all seriousness continue to put money in these crops and neglect the potential of essential oils?
Pimento is the only traditional crop that did not show a decline over the past five years. This is because pimento produces essential oils and is marketed as such. The architects of this agricultural production plan have been caught napping.
Many agricultural plans have been put forward before with the same strategies for the same old crops with the same mindset administrators. Is it surprising then that we get the same poor results?
One major problem in agriculture which was not addressed in the Agricultural Production Plan is the matter of credit. The vast majority of farmers in this country do not have access to credit. The fortunate few who can access credit find that the cost (interest rate) is too high for them to farm profitably.
Although the document under review is all of 72 pages, only about three sentences were devoted to the credit problem. These sentences acknowledged that there was a problem but did not suggest how the problem may be solved.
If credit is not extended to farmers in adequate amounts at reasonable interest rates and in a timely manner, then there will be no progress in increasing our agricultural output. This in the long run will affect the overall growth and development of the economy. Take for instance pumping a lot of money in sugar-cane factories will not improve the industry if the farmers who grow the sugar-cane do not have access to adequate credit to improve their yields per acre. It should be kept in mind that sugar-cane farmers in years gone by were achieving between 40-45 tons per acre. Today they are averaging 17-20 tons per acre. Due to the lack of credit, they are unable to properly maintain their crops.
I have in the past written extensively on the matter of credit. I have also highlighted the potential of essential oils showing how they can benefit the national economy.
It would appear that the architects of this Agricultural Production Plan are not aware of the potential of essential oils or the seriousness of credit to the sector and if this is the case it may be worthwhile appointing someone to pay close attention to this column.
K. C. Soares is a former banker and is now a business consultant with Soledad Financial Services Limited. E-mail: soledad@netcomm-jm.com.
