Small farmers to get climate-smart agri training
SOME 5,000 smallholder farmers in the parishes of Portland, St Thomas and St Mary are slated to benefit from specialised training to increase their capacity to implement climate smart agricultural practices.
Under the project, dubbed ‘Accelerating the Uptake of Climate-smart Agriculture in selected African, Caribbean and Pacific countries’, to be implemented in three beneficiary countries – Jamaica, Mali and Ethiopia – the training will be conducted over a two-year period.
The project is being implemented in collaboration with the Technical Centre for Agriculture and Rural Cooperation (CTA), based in the Netherlands. The launch of the Jamaican component was held yesterday. It will be executed through a partnership involving the CTA, the Climate Change Division in the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation, and the Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA).
IMPROVING SECTOR
The project is aimed at promoting the incorporation of information communications technology (ICT) tools as an element of climate-smart agriculture and the widespread adoption of climate-smart practices that are aligned with national priorities. This is in an effort to improve the resilience of the agriculture sector, enhance productivity and food security, and secure the income of smallholder farmers, the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation advised in a press release.
In welcoming the partnership, principal director in the ministry, Una May Gordon, explained that promoting the use of climatesmart agriculture will go a far way in the resilience-building effort and improving food security.
“The fact that the activities will be carried out in alignment with the national priorities will allow us to keep at the forefront of our minds the fulfilment of our obligations under the Paris Agreement as it relates to our nationally determined contributions (NDCs),” she said.
Meanwhile, Oluyede Ajayi, the CTA’s senior programme coordinator, explained that the intervention will be carried out through ICTbased extension approaches.
“We will be working with beneficiary countries to review national climate change priorities, including NDCs, and identify opportunities and entry points for the promotion and implementation of climatesmart agricultural technologies. We will also be facilitating training and access to ICTenabled information and advisory services for smallholder farmers to provide weather and climate-smart agricultural services,” Ajayi said.