WATCH: There’s money in yam, says PM
“Yam, good ole Jamaican yam; yellow yam, renta yam, the other kinda yam. That yam is doing very well in terms of earning foreign exchange. Yam, all yam, doing very well,” Prime Minister Andrew Holness said during a laughter-filled “sermon” on food freedom at Denbigh Agricultural Show in Clarendon on Monday.
Though delivered with levity, Holness was making the point that, with traditional crops not as profitable as they used to be, local farmers should look to emerging crops such as yam and ackee for exportation.
“There are some crops which are emerging which we don’t pay too much attention to because we see the numbers for sugar cane and so on. But, you know banana not doing so well these days…we still get some money but not a lot,” the Prime Minister said.
“In fact, it (yam) is one of our highest foreign exchange earners in agricultural exports.”
Holness also highlighted the need for more business people to commit to agriculture on a larger scale.
He was speaking at the launch of the ‘Grow Smart Eat Smart’ campaign on Emancipation Day, the final leg of the 68th staging of the Denbigh Agricultural, Industrial and Food Show in Clarendon.