Fifteen students from the Portland-based

College of Agriculture, Science and Education (CASE) will head to Israel on

Monday, November 25 for an 11-month agricultural training programme.

The students, who will be in Israel until

October 2020, are the first cohort to benefit under a scholarship programme

that was initiated following a visit to the Middle Eastern country last year by

a Jamaican delegation headed by Agriculture Minister Audley Shaw.

Speaking at a media briefing at the ministry’s

St. Lucia Avenue office in New Kingston on Wednesday, Minister Shaw noted that

the students will be exposed to advanced farming technologies and techniques,

which have resulted in high levels of productivity in Israel.

He noted that the Middle Eastern country,

which is surrounded by deserts, is able to extract salt from seawater to

irrigate lands “because they don’t have the rainfall that God has blessed us

with in Jamaica, and [yet] their level of agricultural productivity is

unbelievable”.

He added that despite limited rainfall,

Israel has been able to produce orchard crops such as oranges, mangoes and

avocado and has employed techniques to preserve the little rainfall it

receives.

Shaw urged the students headed to Israel to

take back what they have learnt to make Jamaica a more productive country.

“Be inspired when you go to Israel. Take

your mission seriously. Jamaica is in need of your productivity; Jamaica is in

need of what you can learn and bring back, so that we, too, can build our

levels of productivity in this country,” Shaw said.

In the meantime, the minister praised the

efforts of the Economic Growth Council (EGC) and the Israeli Honorary Consul

for Jamaica, Gideon Siterman, in collaborating with the Ministry to initiate

the scholarship award.

The programme is being sponsored by Israel,

with the NCB Foundation footing a substantial part of the students’ travel

cost.

Another 50 students from across Jamaica will benefit from the progamme next year.

— JIS