The following are excerpts from Agriculture Minister Dr Christopher Tufton's contribution to the sectoral debate in Parliament yesterday.

A critical part of the productivity process hinges on the extent to which we have the capacity to provide adequate and efficient post-harvest care. This includes, reaping, warehousing or storage, grading and sorting, value-added processing, marketing and distribution.

We intend to do the following this year to improve post-harvest infrastructure:

1. establish a unit within the ministry to address the development of post-harvest infrastructure; and

2. establish five wholesale market facilities for handling and selling produce and livestock. These facilities will have cold storage, water, shelter, toilets, scales and simple display areas for commercial activities. The infrastructure will cost the Government approximately $20 million.

3. We also intend to install cold storage facilities at Montpelier, Moneague, Denbigh, New market, White River, Wait-A-Bit, Christiana, Southfield and Hounslow, where primary producers will be able to store excess capacity. So far, we have in storage 160,000lb of Irish potatoes.

4. Additionally, we will establish two banana ripening houses in Maroon Town in St James and Trinity in St Mary, at a cost of J$1.4 million. These facilities will be leased to the farmers' organisation to administer on behalf of its members.

5. We will upgrade the AMC complex on Spanish Town Road, including the repair of the cold storage facilities at a cost of $10 million.

Private entities

6. We will construct two CIDA/GOJ-sponsored post-harvest processing and packaging facilities in St Elizabeth and Manchester. These facilities will be leased to private entities and will be engaged in grading, sorting, packaging, storage and logistics management, as well as the marketing of agricultural produce. This is expected to cost $50 million.

7. We will construct three pepper mash facilities in the parishes of Clarendon, St Elizabeth and St Mary at an estimated cost of $80 million. These facilities will support the Government's major pepper expansion programme through the processing of hot peppers for the condiments market.

8. We will complete the construction of a yam-packaging house in Trelawny at a cost of $15 million. This is scheduled to be completed by September 2009, and leased as a buying and packaging house for yam farmers in Trelawny, Manchester and Clarendon.

Mr Speaker, these projects are public/private sector partnerships that will help our farmers to grow better produce and our consumers to get better value for money.

New product development

Last year, we embarked on a number of initiatives to introduce new products.

We have started our rice trials and this has shown the capacity to produce up to seven tonnes per hectare, which is comparable to major rice-growing regions. This year, we intend to expand this effort by involving small farmers in Westmoreland and St Elizabeth in rice production. We have recruited 70 farmers for this project and are in the process of purchasing machinery for planting and reaping.

This year, we will continue and include tests on orchard development with nutmeg, pimento, and a range of herbs such as cerasee, fever grass, peppermint, khus-khus and sorrel. These are all intended to be used in value-added production such as teas and juices.

Praedial larceny

Praedial larceny is another major area of risk to our farmers. It is a cancer on our farmers' efforts. It can no longer be described as petty theft but organised criminality. We must address this scourge on our farmers' efforts through public education, clear laws and efficient enforcement.

Last year, the ministry commissioned a study, on how to deal with this problem. This year, we will introduce new measures to improve enforcement. I have already met with the minister of national security, Attorney General's Office and the police and military high command to discuss the way forward. A team was established to detail these new approaches and this will be announced shortly.

In the meantime, let me say that critical to controlling praedial larceny is the establishment of traceability of farm crops and livestock. This means farmers must register their farms and farm activities. Otherwise, the system will not work. In addition, we will be embarking on a programme, in conjunction with the Ministry of Health, to more effectively monitor our food chain through the consolidation of slaughter houses or abattoirs and increased inspection of foods in the trade. This will not only improve the quality of our foods, but also assist with the praedial larceny challenge.

This year, we intend to spend J$29 million on an Animal Identification System that will have the following impact:

identification and registration of all livestock in Jamaica

a computerised database system inclusive of passports and tags which will be able to trace animals from birth to slaughter

a database system with the ability to store and generate vital information on domestic animals

traceability system which will facilitate tracing meat from farm to fork.

This system will not only ensure the safety of our meats but will also be an effective tool in the fight against praedial larceny.