Championing agriculture
published: Thursday | May 8, 2003
THE EDITOR, Sir:
THE BUDGET presentation by the Minister of Finance has dealt the backbone of this country a crippling blow. The agricultural sector is already reeling from the pummelling job of praedial larceny, lack of a proper marketing system, the high cost of irrigation water, lack of farm hands, the high cost of fertilisers, insecticide and weedicides, to name a few. In short, the agricultural sector is punch-drunk. It is out cold on its feet.
If people are to see agriculture as the way forward for our economy, then it must be presented to them in such a way, that they can see the prospect of them earning a decent living. They must not be made to believe that agriculture is a profession for the illiterate, the uninformed, the hopeless and the forlorn.
Recently, on the front page of a Saturday Gleaner, a six-year-old student of Smurf Early Childhood Centre was dressed up to depict a farmer. This was at the launch of the National Labour Day celebration held at Kings House. I believe he epitomised in the minds of most Jamaicans what a farmer looks like. He had no front teeth, a torn-up straw hat, a faded overhaul, a shabby pair of shoes on his feet and a machete in his hand.
Farmers should be portrayed as professionals, capable of achieving as much as any other professionals. The small farmer should be made to feel that, by the dint of hard work, he too can one day drive a Pajero and live in a house like the one rented for the Bank of Jamaica Governor.
Mr. Minister, it is full time that you wake up and start championing the cause of the Jamaican farmers.
