THE year-old impasse between the fish farmers of Hill Run in Central St Catherine and the National Irrigation Commission (NIC) could soon come to an end, depending on the workability of the recommendations made by the Inter-American Development Bank’s (IDB) consultant, who has been assessing the proposals to provide the farmers with water for their ponds.

According to chief executive officer of the NIC Dr Mark Richards, the consultant’s report was expected to be submitted to the Ministry of Agriculture on Monday.

Richards, who was speaking at this week’s

Jamaica Observer Monday Exchange, explained that there was a stalemate after the ministry decided that Hill Run would be made into an agro-park, and the NIC put forward its design for water supply to the area. He noted that when the company put the design to the farmers there had been “overwhelming support”, but that a few months later there appeared to be uncertainty with a number of questions raised about the design.

The Hill-Run Fish Farmers and Agriculture Association has even sought the intervention of the Office of the Public Defender, claiming that the NIC has denied its members access to water. NIC has proposed a piped conduit system, but the association disagreed and has expressed concern that the water would cost them significantly more than the $1.83 per cubic metre that they are now paying to individually pump water from the present water source. The association has also charged that part of the original irrigation system to the area had been decommissioned and re-routed to other areas.

Richards contended that instead of farmers pumping water on their own, they would have access to a more evenly distributed, efficient supply. “Majority of the farmers are in agreement with that system of everybody having equal access to the supply whenever it is needed. We have provided our cost breakout structure to the IDB for them to do their deliberations. They have taken the cost now [of] how much it takes to fill a pond, productivity, and are looking at the business of fish farming in making their suggestions as to how we move,” he outlined.

As to the substantial increase from $1.83 to $45.00 per cubic metre, Richards denied that there would be any such jump in the cost of supply. “We have no idea where that figure came from. A lot has been said about Hill Run and a number of reports have been made in the media… [But] we don’t want to take it to that level. We are still committed to having this completed. We also want whatever we do to be knowledge-driven. We have been put in a bad light in many of these articles that have come out,” he asserted.

Director of Technical Services Milton Henry said, too, that there is no truth to concerns that with the proposed new system, filling a pond could take 27 days instead of 72 hours.

“When we took everything into consideration, that design was the one that we thought would be best suited to the situation. We didn’t impose it; we put it forward. The numbers in terms of cost, we have estimated those, and we believe that what we have put forward is a good workable design. We are not seeing those numbers of 27 days. We don’t know where those numbers come from,” he told

Observer editors and reporters.

Meanwhile, Richards stressed that in putting forward the design that it did, the commission had taken a number of things into consideration, including the benefits and reducing the incidents of pilfering from the NIC’s system. “The Hill-Run situation is dynamic and it’s ongoing,” he said.

“So we are moving on and the design process continues. We will definitely be going back to the Hill Run farmers,” he stated. Richards said though, that the NIC was “very taken aback for the length of time that it has taken everybody to be on board”, given the significant amount of resources that the farmers have already invested.