ST GEORGE’S, Grenada (CMC) — A glut on the international market is resulting in a drop in the price offered to nutmeg farmers in Grenada, according to Leo Cato, the chairman of the Grenada Cooperative Nutmeg Association (GCNA).

Cato said that as of Monday, the nutmeg association is reducing the price of green nutmegs from four to three EC dollars (between US$1.11 and 1.48) per pound and that the GCNA is working on a plan to reduce the amount of nutmeg exported to the European market.

“We think this is the best thing to do, the price is like gasoline and petrol it fluctuates. Europe is where most of our nutmeg goes, two thirds of our nutmeg goes to Europe and that market determine what we pay our farmers, so when we receive less we have to pay less,” he said.

Cato, who last year had the uneasy task of informing nutmeg farmers that they will not be receiving an annual end of year bonus because of receiving reduce price of nutmeg, said that the GCNA is now looking towards non-European markets to sell the product.

“So as part of our strategy the plan is to move away from our dependence on Europe, two thirds of what is produced goes there, we want to supply markets that are giving us better prices,” Cato said, adding that besides Argentina, the GCNA is looking at Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries including Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago and Antigua.

“We are now trying to ramp up sales where the prices are better, so we can sell heavier quantities for better prices,” he said.

Before 2004, Grenada was the second highest producer of nutmeg on the world’s market behind Indonesia. The island lost much nutmeg production as a result of a hurricane in that year.