OVER 400 farmers from communities in Manchester, St Catherine, Clarendon, St Andrew, St Mary and St Thomas are beneficiaries under a project co-ordinated between the Ministry of Agriculture and the Jamaica Social Investment Fund (JSIF) to build capacity in farm management.

Under the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB)-funded Community Investment Project, JSIF provided $6.9 million for agro-business technical assistance training which is expected to improve the way farmers plan and produce for the market.

Training was executed by the Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA) between January and April 2014.

Additionally, the farmers were exposed to subjects including personal hygiene and food safety; sprayer calibration; safe use of pesticides and disaster management; marketing and agricultural business management; crop diversification training and linkages to micro financing.

Farmers came from the rural communities of Bottom Bonnett and China Street in St Catherine; Mount Vernon and Bonny Gate in St Mary; Hayfield and Richmond Gap in St Thomas; Brandon Hill in St Andrew; Top Quarter in Clarendon; and Green Bottom, Bottom Coleyville, Long Coffee and Contrivance in Manchester.

Four hundred and sixty0eight farmers from within the communities listed were registered for training.

Rhonda Lumsden-Lue, general manager for JSIF, said in these communities most people conduct small-scale business and are willing to expand the scope of their business, but they lack the capacity and financial support to do so.

She noted that while Jamaica has the urgent aim to substitute high-value imports with local production, in order to execute this on a sustainable basis, shortcomings in the area of management training and finance among farmers will have to be addressed.

Participants were also exposed to sessions with the PC Bank and Jamaica National Building Society which has a microfinance programme.

Farmers from China Street in St Catherine who benefited from the Agro Business Technical Assistance project.