EDITORIAL - Roger Clarke's learning to swim

It may indeed be an inability to swim why Roger Clarke, the agriculture minister, is sometimes accused - or so he claims - of being able to only walk on water.

Translation: Failures are highlighted and he gets no credit for initiatives in agriculture that go right.

Well, this newspaper wishes to highlight a few things which, even if they may not be entirely of his design, appear to be going right under the minister's watch, and which may serve as catalysts for the transformation of the island's agriculture sector.

This week, Red Stripe, the Jamaican subsidiary of the drinks company, Diageo, signed an agreement with the Agro-Investment Corporation (AIC), an agency of Mr Clarke's ministry, to lease 36 acres of land at Bernard Lodge, on the island's south-coastal plains, for the cultivation of cassava.

This to be a pilot farm. Red Stripe's aim is to have perhaps 2,500 acres, through its own effort and by independent farmers, under cassava, with the aim of substituting up to 30 per cent of the imported input - corn and barley - for the brewing of its Red Stripe lager beer.

" … We are absolutely confident that we will be in a position to replace approximately 20 per cent of our imported brewing material by 2016," said the company's CEO, Cedric Blair.

NOT RED STRIPE ALONE

Such attempts at backward and forward linkages in the production chain are limited not only to Red Stripe.

Caribbean Broilers, the poultry/meat and animal-feed producer, has started up an 800-acre experimental farm with sorghum, also on the St Catherine plains. It would like to have as much of 7,000 acres under sorghum in Jamaica, which would allow to displace, with domestic production, up to 15 per cent of the corn and other raw material it imports for its feed mills.

Another meat and animal-feed conglomerate, Jamaica Broilers, is experimenting with 100 acres of corn in the flatlands of south-central Jamaica. That company imports more than 130 tonnes of corn a year and hopes it can substitute some of it with Jamaica-grown grain.

The economic feasibility of some of these efforts is yet to be determined, and we suspect that growing corn competitively in Jamaica, for the purpose now contemplated, might be difficult. But that is hardly the point.

COULD ENHANCE PRODUCTIVITY

The more important fact is that large Jamaican firms are engaging in research and development, which may well lead not only to the advancement of the intended projects, but others that widen production and enhance productivity in the Jamaican economy.

For instance, in Jamaica, agriculture represents about seven per cent of GDP, but around 12 per cent if agriculture's contribution to downstream production is considered. However, under 40 per cent of the country's agricultural output goes to processing. In Costa Rica, it is closer to 60 per cent, and America, 80 per cent.

Such is better viewed in the context of our food-import bill of around US$900 million and the estimate that perhaps a third of this could be displaced with domestically grown substitutes. In other words, as the highlighted initiatives indicate, there is potential for food processing and job creation in agriculture.

Importantly, these projects hint, refreshingly at a modern, technological, business-oriented approach to agriculture - and the fact that Mr Clarke may be learning to swim.

The opinions on this page, except for the above, do not necessarily reflect the views of The Gleaner. To respond to a Gleaner editorial, email us: editor@gleanerjm.com or fax: 922-6223. Responses should be no longer than 400 words. Not all responses will be published.