Bartlett wants ALEX to become a regional platform

WESTERN BUREAU:

Tourism Minister Edmund Bartlett want Jamaica’s Agricultural Linkages Exchange (ALEX) to be expanded into a Caribbean-wide platform as part of a broader push to build a regional agricultural logistics network capable of supplying the tourism industry.

Bartlett said ALEX, which connects farmers with hotels and tourism buyers in Jamaica, could be used to link producers and buyers across the Caribbean.

“We think that there is a need for that concept to escalate and to become a Caribbean agrolinkages exchange, and that will allow for the farmers in Barbados to be connected with the supply source in Jamaica through the ALEX platform,” Bartlett told regional agriculture ministers and other delegates at the 20th Caribbean Week of Agriculture Conference held in Trelawny.

He noted that possibility of linking the nutmeg farmer in Grenada to the hotels in Saint Lucia via the same platform, and for the technology to extend to enable pricing quantities to be made known, availability of timelines for supplies, and all the necessary data and information that is required to ensure that that transaction can take place.

Bartlett said the platform had already facilitated significant trade between small farmers and hoteliers in Jamaica.

“In Jamaica, we established a new policy around local first. What that means is that we’re building the productive capacity of our local farmers and agro-processors to be able to supply against the demand of tourism,” he said.

Bartlett said more than J$2 billion in trade had taken place between small farmers and hoteliers through ALEX over four years.

But he argued that technology alone would not resolve the region’s supply problems without a seamless logistics mechanism. As such, he proposed the establishment of a Caribbean Tourism Agricultural Logistics Centre to aggregate produce and agro-processed goods from across the region and distribute them to tourism markets.

“It’s not a warehouse we’re looking for, but what we’re seeking is a repository of all the supplies from within the Caribbean area. What Barbados provides, what Guyana provides, what Jamaica provides, and these are not only in terms of the hard agricultural produce, but the agro-processing outcomes; the nectars and the juices and the jams and the jellies, and all of that ... ,” he said.

Bartlett said the regional system should also address standards, financing and the movement of goods, while calling for harmonised policies and procedures so that food and agricultural standards approved in one Caribbean country could be recognised across the region.

“The harmonisation of policies, the standardisation of procedures, will enable an early beginning that will build confidence, so that Marriott will not want to go to Miami to source its supplies, but can source them in the Caribbean,” he said.

Bartlett said the push was necessary to reduce the region’s dependence on imported food and retain more tourism earnings within the Caribbean.

“The resources of the Caribbean will feed the Caribbean tourism, and the leakage that goes by way of exports will be tapped,” he said.

He also stressed the need for reliable supply, noting that hotels require certainty on quantity, quality, price and delivery.

“You see, the certitude of supplies is critical because we are a consumption-driven activity,” Bartlett said.

He said Caribbean tourism must ultimately become “regenerative and not extractive”, with agriculture playing a central role in retaining tourism earnings within the region.

albert.feruson@gleanerjm.com