GCCI agri sub-committee completes initial training with Region Six farmers

The agriculture sub-committee of the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) has since completed its first round of Awareness and Training Workshops in Region Six, which has benefitted a total of 115 farmers and agroprocessors.

The GCCI said the activity was an outcome of a meeting between GCCI and Minister of Agriculture, Zulfikar Mustapha in September, 2022.

A press release from the chamber said its sub-committee, spearheaded by Chairman Brian Edwards, discussed with Minister Mustapha ways in which the Ministry of Agriculture and the private sector can collaborate during Agriculture Month 2022. The release said Mustapha pledged his Ministry’s support to the Agri Committee (GCCI) and its partners to conduct a series of Awareness and Training workshops focusing on farmers, especially women and youth. The Minister implored GCCI that such an initiative must continue beyond agriculture month and spread out to the various farming communities throughout Guyana. A team comprised of both private sector organizations and semi-autonomous agencies entered into a collaborative partnership to deliver awareness and training programmes to farmers, with support from the Ministry of Agriculture and its agencies. Stakeholder businesses include the Inter-American Institute for Corporation on Agriculture (IICA), Guyana Bank for Trade and Industry (GBTI), Guyana Food Safety Authority (GFSA), Institute of Private Enterprise Development (IPED), Small Business Bureau (SBB), World University Service of Canada (WUSC), and Empower Guyana.

According to GCCI, the initiative was launched in Region 6 with plans to expand to regions 2, 3, 4, 5, and 10 in 2023. The training sessions focused on four key areas, to help farmers, women, and youth build their capacity by encouraging them to use climate-smart technology such as the use of micronutrients to boost production, improve yield and the quality of their produce which ultimately leads to improved income. Farmers were also urged to treat agriculture as a business so that they can produce to sell rather than selling what they produce as this will help them to access local and eventually overseas markets. Information on access to financing, business function, good agricultural practices, understanding and honouring contractual obligations, and access to incubator services were also presented to producers in Albion, East Bank Berbice, Black Bush Polder, and Crabwood Creek.

In this regard, the chamber says it applauds the concrete actions taken by its agriculture sub-committee to address the challenges facing farmers generally and especially women and youth, and encourages them to begin to prepare themselves to access overseas markets and contribute to President Irfaan Ali’s vision of reducing CARICOM’s food import bill by 25 per cent by 2025. GCCI also said it looks forward to continued support from the Ministry of Agriculture and participating partners. The agriculture sub-committee meanwhile expressed its thanks to the Ministry of Agriculture and its agencies including the National Agricultural Research and Extension Institute (NAREI), Guyana Marketing Corporation (GMC), and the Guyana Food Safety Authority (GFSA) for their unwavering support and the Extension Officers from both NAREI and GMC who were instrumental in making the sessions in Region 6 a success by ensuring that farmers were invited and all logistics for the events were in place.