CASTLE HILL, St Thomas — Ronald Cowie has no formal training in organic farming, but he is determined to grow his pineapples and other food crops organically.

At his farms in Hayfield and Castle Hill in St Thomas, Cowie has 14 hectares with organically grown pineapples, which should be ready for reaping within the next four months. Also on his farms are bananas, plantains, bird peppers, pumpkins and other plants, which he has intercropped to make maximum use of the land.

He has provided employment for five young men from the communities where his farms are located.

Cowie told JIS News that the idea to grow pineapples organically came about four years ago when a friend offered him a slice of pine, which was grown in his kitchen garden. The fruit, which normally irritates his mouth, posed no such problem on that occasion, he said.

He found out that it was grown with organic manure.

Cowie collected a few suckers of the fruit from his friend and since then, he began planting pineapple suckers on lands that he had inherited from his parents. He does not use manufactured fertilisers or pesticides on his crops — instead all the inputs in crop production are natural.

The farm has a compost heap, which Cowie explained, is the most important part of organic farming. He uses vegetable waste and rabbit manure collected from his rabbit farm, which are mixed together and remain covered with plastic for about three weeks to generate organic fertiliser.

For pest control, his strategy is ensuring that there are wide spaces between his plants, as well as intercropping with bird peppers, which serve to ward off pests. Cowie also sprays his crops with the juice extracted from bird peppers. He collects the juice from a drum in which he stores the pepper and leaves them to rot.

But the St Thomas farmer’s plans to plant pineapples on a large scale has met with many challenges.

“I could never get the amount of suckers that I need,” he lamented, adding that he has had to purchase from different farms in the parish in order to increase his cultivation.

As a result, he has plots of pineapples, which he has labelled with different names such as Llandewey, Johnson Mountain, Danvers Pen and Sunning Hill. These are names of places in the parish where he has bought suckers. He said that his customers now refer to the pineapples by the names given to them.

During last year’s flood rains he experienced a major setback, when he lost some 227 kilograms of pineapples and 100 rabbits. But undaunted, he has plans to cultivate another eight hectares of pineapple if he gets additional land.

“Last year I got a good beating from the rain but this year I believe that I’ll do a better job. You have to fight on and keep working and hope for the best,” he told JIS News.

He also has plans to purchase a jeep to monitor his farms more frequently and to transport his produce.

So far, despite brisk business, he said, he has not made a profit from his organically grown pineapples, as all the profit is ploughed back into the business.

“As soon as I get the money, I have to buy suckers,” he said.

Currently, he sells his fruits to vendors in Morant Bay and from as far away as St Catherine.

Meanwhile, Cowie was full of praise for the Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA), which has provided support and technical assistance over the years. In addition to helping him market his produce, he said, RADA has promised to help in locating a venue in Castle Hill, which could be used as a depot where his buyers can purchase his crops.

“I don’t want to move the pine around because they’re easy to squeeze. I just want to put them in the depot and people can come and get them,” Cowie said.