Opposition Leader having success on his banana farm with new technologies

Opposition Leader Arnhim Eustace believes that if proper technology is applied to banana farming, there would be greater output.

Eustace, who was speaking on the New Times radio programme on Nice Radio yesterday, said that he and his wife have begun applying these new technologies at their farm at Mt Greenan and are now producing more bananas.{{more}}

“We are producing more organic bananas and I am telling you, the yield from the new technology, which uses some of the local fertilizers, like chicken dung…and a different way of digging the holes, we getting bunches now that easily reach 15-18 hands. I can show you a bunch exceeding 18 hands now!”

The Leader of the Opposition, who has for some time now been pushing for a revitalization of the banana industry, stated that there is currently a demand in France for an additional 150,000 tonnes of bananas.

“So here we now have a possibility of both the British and the French market being available to us for banana export,” Eustace said.

He added that if the New Democratic Party (NDP) had won the general elections, there would have been a rehabilitation of the banana industry.

“We told you from that time, that we will be doing 1,000 acres in the first instance…rehabilitate 1,000 acres of bananas, but we were concerned that given the long stint with farmers being unable to export bananas with the problems with Black Sigatoka and so forth, that we are going to provide income support to banana farmers who are going back into production,” Eustace stated.

He said this rehabilitation would have grossed at least $21 million in the first year.

He added that 500 farmers would have been given income support of $500 monthly to look after home expenses, such as household bills and groceries.

Eustace noted that in St Lucia there is now talk about giving a subsidy to farmers and while it may not be the same as what he had in mind, the principle would be the same.

Additionally, he added that this Government is still not doing enough to rehabilitate this industry.

“They say they were going to do 2,000 acres; nothing was provided in the Estimates to do one acre, far less 2,000, nothing, and we are still of the view that you can’t get this economy going without paying more attention to agriculture generally and bananas in particular. Banana is not a dead crop; bananas can make money…,” he said.

“I want the Government of St Vincent and the Grenadines to take the matter on board and get farmers back into production. We not earning any foreign exchange and we have to earn foreign exchange and agriculture is a big earner of foreign exchange, so unless the agricultural issue is properly addressed…we going to have increasing difficulty with the economic growth in this country. We have to improve our performance, the whole economic performance.”

The Opposition Leader also pointed out that according to the Economic Commission of Latin America (ECLA), banana provides for six per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), as opposed to tourism, which only provides two per cent. (CM)