A group of six parliamentarians from European Union member states and ACP developing countries will visit Jamaica next week on a mission to explore sugar and bananas, and crime.

The group will tour sugar and banana states, visit crime-plagued Spanish Town, and meet with the Jamaica’s political and business leaders.

The African Caribbean and Pacific States/European Union (ACP/EU) Joint Parliamentary Assembly Mission to Jamaica will arrive Monday for the five-day visit. Its members will include:

. co-president Glenys Kinnock from the United Kingdom, a member of the Socialist Group in the European Parliament;

. Michael Gahler from Germany;

. Youssouf Moussa Dawaleh of Djibouti;

. Joeli Nabika;

. Michael Wood; and

. Neville Bissemeber.

They will be joined by Member of Parliament for South Central St Catherine, Sharon Hay Webster, who is also co-president of the assembly.

The group will meet with prime minister PJ Patterson, opposition leader Bruce Golding, and president of the Caribbean Court of Justice, Michael De la Bastide, who will also be here on a visit.

The mission will view first hand of some of the island’s most perplexing problems from visits to the Duckenfield Sugar Estate in St Thomas, the Eastern Banana Estates in St Mary, and the old capital of Spanish Town, where meetings with the non-governmental organisation Children First and selected community leaders from the parish of St Catherine will be held.

The group is also to see firsthand the violence-wracked sections of Spanish Town.

Hay-Webster, whose personal involvement with ‘peace negotiations’ between warring criminals gangs in her constituency has been strongly criticised as misguided, told the Sunday Observer that the five-day visit would give the mission an opportunity to interface directly with the Jamaican people.

“When we talk about conditions here, they will not just take our word for it but they will be able to see and talk with persons who are delivering a number of services in agriculture, social services, social development, education, entertainment and culture,” said Hay-Webster.

The MP said opportunities for funding of specific projects could likely arise from the various visits and meetings.

The visits to the sugar and banana estates will give the mission a first hand view of these industries which are facing crises due to the slashing of subsidised prices to the EU market and increased competition, especially from Latin American producers.