KINGSTON, Jamaica — The Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation has announced that approximately 5000 smallholder farmers in the parishes of Portland, St Thomas and St Mary will benefit from technical and technological expertise to increase their capacity to implement climate-smart agricultural practices.

The ministry, in a release today, stated that farmers will be engaged through a project entitled “Accelerating the Uptake of Climatesmart Agriculture in selected African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries” which is being implemented in three beneficiary countries – Jamaica, Mali and Ethiopia – over a two year period.

The project is being implemented in collaboration with the Technical Centre for Agriculture and Rural Cooperation (CTA), based in the Netherlands. The Jamaican component is to be executed through a partnership involving the CTA, the Climate Change Division in the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation (CCD) and the Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA), the ministry said.

The project is aimed at promoting the incorporation of information communication technology (ICT) tools as an element of climate-smart agriculture and the widespread adoption of climate-smart practices that are aligned with national priorities, in an effort to improve the resilience of the agriculture sector, enhance productivity and food security and secure the income of smallholder farmers.

 “Promoting the use of climate-smart agriculture will go a far way in the resilience building effort and improving food security for our people. The fact that the activities will be carried out in alignment with the national priorities will allow us to keep at the forefront of our minds the fulfilment of our obligations under the Paris Agreement as it relates to our nationally determined contributions (NDCs),” said Principal Director of the CCD, UnaMay Gordon.

Oluyede Ajayi, the CTA’s senior programme coordinator, who is in Jamaica for the project launch on June 21, says the intervention will be carried out through ICT-based extension approaches.

“We will be working with beneficiary countries to review national climate change priorities, including NDCs, and identify opportunities and entry points for the promotion and implementation of climate-smart agricultural technologies. We will also be facilitating training and access to ICT-enabled information and advisory services for smallholder farmers to provide weather and climate-smart agricultural services,” said Ajayi.