Where do jobs come from? What about silly Farmer Joe?
GRANNY said babies came by the stork. So where do jobs come from? Again there is a puerile notion that we are entitled to a job created by the Government. But jobs are made by a person who acts on his idea and puts his capital to work in a business, rather than let the bank do it.
Is it your divine right to get a job? Go pray, then! Cabinets may be blamed for our economy, and you for not choosing a qualification in demand so you can get a job. When we had the UWI alone there were few degrees; they had value and everyone found a job. Now, with 20-plus bodies giving degrees, and a country producing fewer crops, less bauxite, yet imports, and consumes more than it exports; how do we create jobs? Mr, Ms Consumer, what local goods do you buy to grow the local business so it can create the new jobs you desire? Speak up!
Few students check on the jobs before they chose a course. Many just like a career; it was popular with friends, prestigious or easy. They learnt to write a job letter beginning “Dear Sir” and ending “Yours faithfully”, but this is changing thanks to “Junior Achievement” in secondary schools. Many now learn to get a trade name, food handlers’ permit, or form a company. Go see “BizTown” at Caenwood and be inspired to start a business and make jobs. Many write letters to fit advertisements; are “self-starters” are “highly motivated” as if to declaim the words with sound and fury makes it so.
Today, some 190,000 are chronically unemployed. Most were school leavers, but also people who trusted a degree and are broke and in debt. This group now creates a new criminal class. A job is dignity, progress, self-esteem, and students must be taught to take one or make one. The Ministry of Education is moving to mainstream “Junior Achievement” — hands-on starting and running a business — and uplift it to tertiary level. Our jobless future may change if graduates know theory and practice of business and are comfortable with risks. So what of the massive?
Farming was once a catch-all for underachievers, and we must reposition micro farmers. Agriculture is a pillar of growth for our serial Cabinets since Independence. Look at us now, every metric of production is below two decades ago. I argue that we need a Ministry of Food to focus on crops, livestock, fisheries — even for 10 years. We got the British model and will not change to fit reality. Farmers are the largest cohort of “employed” people. Who are they?
A week ago the Observer featured a talented Frome Technical High School student doing a parody of “Farmer Joe” with tear-up pants and raggedy straw hat. That boy will not choose farming, nor will his mates willingly carry the ubiquitous machete — though they might end up there. Machete farming is the default of the low achiever; very much like teaching to the jobless man with a degree. Of course, once the Jamaica Teaching Council (JTC) is in law there will be no more “oh I can’t get a job so I will cotch and do some teaching”. But the machete farmer will be with us. The mass of micro farmers will not emerge until school raises its game and he earns more than the minimum wage. Middle class people of substance will retire into farming, but the machete farmer is the image of a farmer. Do you know that, despite thousands of rural Jamaican migrants and good farm subsidy, neither they nor their kids go to a farm school in the UK. They drive buses and grow stuff in the yard, but there was only one commercial black farmer in all the United Kingdom. We profess but do we really love farming?
No CSEC or CAPE student has farming in his sights; note that a third of farmers are female as per the FAO Census. Rural boys know farmers — no options; no five CSEC subjects; usually on PATH unlike a mason, carpenter, welder or mechanic. A farmer can’t afford a vacation with his kids after harvest — modern slavery. Most farmers subsidise their crops, but productivity is low. God help us if we had to pay the true cost of a banana. The cream is the farm worker who goes to America; next the local one who gets salary, holidays, earns a pension from the NIS and a shot at a NHT house. Machete farmers are not that lucky. Farming is not attractive. Do you know the average age is 50 and 60? How many earn the minimum wage? The few top farmers are integrators, whether livestock, poultry, citrus, coffee, bananas, peppers; they upstream land, fertiliser, all inputs (security too) and downstream processing, logistics, ambient/cold chain, market, merchandising. A recent headline read, ‘Farm produce surplus on market, prices reduced’ was not breaking news for many but did poor people in Santa Cruz eat better? We need food sufficiency targets to set actual production against it. Are we 10 per cent below target or above? We jester!
What can we do? Let’s reengineer our culture — what we reward and incentivise and what we sanction and penalise. We incentivise mediocrity, glitz, hype, and diss work, timekeeping, production. We must retrofit farming to incentivise young people. Machete farmers are dominant images but not role models. We have to move farming from default to a place of pride. Work now done on a “Chartered Professional Farmer” will help — qualification in theory and competency-based training will rehabilitate the image of a farmer. They must be eligible for lease land, loans and production kudos. The micro farmer must also be given more help as he grows food. He needs farm inputs, extension services and a market for his produce. Farming needs clear designations, eg the Micro Farmer (ex-machete farmer) nuff respect; Farm worker, local and overseas, Technician — in a specialty as coffee pruning, houseplant culture, budding; Technologist — advanced theory and competence in a complex area-tissue culture, distilling and the “Chartered Farmer”.
The PhD in agriculture will be a researcher, academic, consumer of high degrees or such. He is not a professional farmer unless he has the Chartered qualification, or is under the “grandfather clause”. Farming must stand tall! We must create a commodity exchange on the mobile phone/Internet platforms, bespoke trading apps as every device has a unique identifier and we can triangulate each farmer to give help or take his product. We must give subsidy to food producers just as developed nations do or people will leave the land once they are educated and the economy turns. We must sustain rural life or the lungs of the nation may collapse. We need food security and, like other nations, we must pay for it. Stay conscious, my friend!
Dr Franklin Johnston is a strategist, project manager and advises the minister of education. franklinjohnstontoo@gmail.com