THE BAUXITE mining industry would be the likely employer of many natural science graduates like Allison Pearson, final year biology and chemistry major at the Mandeville-based Northern Caribbean University.

However, two of the major bauxite companies have, between them, closed three plants in less than a year. West Indies Alumina Company was the first to go, when it announced in February that it would shutdown its plants in Ewarton, St Catherine and Kirkvine, Manchester.

This was followed by the shut down by Aluminium Partners of Jamaica in St Elizabeth, the largest of the four bauxite/alumina mining companies operating on the island. Together, their hopefully temporary exit will mean a 50-per-cent cut in production and the erasing of two-thirds of the industry's net earning.

Pearson is not worried. She has a passion for the land, resulting from previous studies in agriculture, and plans to use that passion to earn some money. She already has a plot of land - measuring a little less than a quarter of an acre - in south Manchester. The science student is growing cash crops such as tomatoes and pak choy, and she also has a few chickens.

Opportunity

"I'm not sitting and waiting on the dream job. I'm using my skills and everything else and the experience that I have in order to create some opportunity, some entrepreneurship for myself," Pearson told The Sunday Gleaner, after participating in an Editors' Forum at the company's office in Kingston last week.

She hopes the money from her current venture will raise the capital she needs to start her long-term business, which is to own an even bigger farm, as well as a department store, along with her medical practice (she also wants to become a medical doctor).

Pearson surmises that she will raise enough capital in two years to start her dream farm, which will include more cash crops, poultry, fish and a small stock of goat and sheep.

"There is nothing that limits the mind," is this 24-year-old entrepreneur's advice to her batchmates.

"Look around your community and see what the needs are and what you can do. Do not limit yourself to your area alone," Pearson says.

Approaching entrepreneurship in this way also lends itself to developing one's community, she says, while pointing to the opportunity to impart her knowledge to other farmers where knowledge is lacking.

"Even in terms of planting and where to plant. Plenty farmers don't even know about [crop] rotation," she says.

Pearson believes that eventually her venture into business will give her the opportunity to build a community centre that will offer services the community needs, including advice and services to young people who want to go into agriculture.

"I want to help others who might not have had the opportunity I have," she states.

gareth.manning@gleanerjm.com