IICA will assist the Caribbean to boost trade in goods and agricultural information exchange

-as well as to strengthen food security

San Jose, 20 April 2020 (IICA). Thirteen Caribbean Ministers
of Agriculture participated in a videoconference with the Director
General of the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture
(IICA), in which they discussed strategies to bolster agricultural
activity and to safeguard the food supply amidst the ongoing health
crisis, in a region that relies heavily on food imports and on tourism.

Saboto Caesar, Minister of Agriculture of St. Vincent and the
Grenadines, convened the meeting and will also lead the efforts of the
Caribbean Community’s (CARICOM) agrifood sector to tackle the pandemic.

Actions that IICA will undertake with the Caribbean countries to
respond to the Covid-19 pandemic will include facilitating direct
dialogue with Ministers of Agriculture of all regions of the Americas to
share useful information for decision making related to food security,
and providing online training in good agricultural and health practices
for rural workers.

The Ministers of Antigua and Barbuda, The Bahamas, Barbados,
Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, St. Kitts and Nevis, St.
Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Surinam and Trinidad and Tobago
participated in the videoconference.

“The most important role we can play is to inspire and motivate
others”, said Michael Pintard, Minister of Marine Resources and
Agriculture of The Bahamas. “Covid-19 is one of those defining tragedies
from which we will recover. If we unite as a region and as nations, we
will be able to inspire our people”.

Manuel Otero, IICA’s Director General pledged that, “We will work
with the Caribbean countries to devise ambitious proposals to generate a
new extension services strategy based on the use of online and mobile
telephone systems, as well as to drive horizontal cooperation, enabling
the ministers to establish contact with key countries to build bridges
and to take advantage of existing complementarities”.

One of the greatest challenges facing the Caribbean is to ensure that
food imports are not disrupted at this time when the global food trade
is under severe pressure. Barbados, for example, imports 80% of the food
that it consumes. On the other hand, Jamaica and Guyana are
experiencing grave difficulties in storing excess food production after
the closure of borders and the collapse of tourism, which is a vital
industry for the regional economy that is normally the main outlet for
most of the food that is produced locally.

Added to this is the drought now facing the region which makes it
critical for the agriculture sector to increase resilience to climate
variability and to incorporate technology.

IICA’s Director General also proposed to the Caribbean ministers of
Agriculture that international financial agencies should be included in
future online meetings, as part of a strategy to integrate efforts to
guarantee food supply during the current pandemic and in its aftermath. 

More information:

Institutional Communication Division, IICA. 
comunicacion.institucional@iica.int