Hon. Saboto Caesar, Minister of Agriculture, Forestry, Fisheries, Rural Transformation, Industry and Labour in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, is calling on CARICOM member states to “harness the advantages of our smallness,” as it relates to the region’s agriculture sector.
“Our region must position itself as the producer of the healthiest and safest food globally”, Caesar added.
“In St. Vincent and the Grenadines for example, we have extremely clean air, an excellent water supply in quality and quantity and a ban on glyphosate,” said the Minister.
Our producers and marketers in SVG will be harnessing the opportunities to obtain higher prices regionally and internationally, because of the higher food safety production standards that we have advanced.
Can large countries survive without the use of glyphosate and GMOs? They have created food production systems that are heavily dependent on pesticides and herbicides. This will be a significant challenge for multi-nationals producing in larger countries.
In the area of livestock production, with zero glyphosate on our pastures and no aerial spraying, we are producing a better quality meat.
This is now being sort in greater demand, opening a major sector for increases in production. Grenada is one market, however, many other sub-regional markets are currently being explored, and the reviews are positive.
The OECS platform, which is comprised of small independent nation states, should target increasing internally the circulation of safer food, void of the “mega farm” inputs.
A rivival of fair trade practices is ongoing and will auger well not only for consumers but also producers.
