IN the 1970s, under the weight of various domestic and global pressures, the Jamaican economy started to crack, putting many of our then agricultural subsectors severely to the test. Some of them could not withstand the pressure and went under, and production ceased. The assessment of agriculture took centre stage under the microscope of international agencies (International Monetary Fund, United Nation agencies, etc) that advised that the Government must infuse more private players in the economy.

Over 50 years have elapsed since the structural adjustment era, which ensued with hardly any change. While some small improvements have occurred in areas like marketing, storage and logistics as was offered through entities like Agricultural Marketing Corporation (AMC) and the commodity boards, at present the Agricultural Investment Corporation (AIC) is busy disposing of the AMC complex located on Spanish Town Road for non-agricultural uses, thus denying our farmers a facility that had aided them in distribution, storage and export in the past.

But first, a little more detailed historical review for perspective: The structural adjustment policy occasioned massive budget cuts, which in turn negatively affected commodity boards, cooperatives and other Government-funded bodies without appropriate remedies. Although Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA) became the new extension agency in april 1990 to execute some of the functions of the land authorities, community-type leadership eluded the new dispensation due mainly to RADA’s inadequate and cumbersome “organogram” that excluded crop, livestock and other specialists from the agricultural extension modality, creating a disconnect between extension delivery and adoptable research through which farmers were linked to the commodity boards, the various cooperatives, allied institutions such as National People’s Co-operative Bank, AMC, and the coffee and cocoa federations among others.

RADA does most of its work with small and medium-sized farmers engaged in domestic production like vegetables, root and tubers, fruits and livestock operations but limited work is done with the traditional crops with high export potential that were managed by cooperatives, commodity boards and the JAS. Domestic production is of paramount importance to the economy as well because these products are the base of Jamaica’s food security pyramid and offer import substitution equivalency.

As this gap became more pronounced, Jamaica Agricultural Commodity Regulatory Authority (JACRA) started operations to fill the functions left vacant by the defunct commodity boards and their affiliated cooperatives, but JACRA’s multiple function operations os problematic because apart from the regulatory mandate, JACRA is also saddled with extension delivery to farmers involved in traditional crops, duplicating the role of RADA.

The imposition of JACRA doesn’t facilitate improved productivity as was the case with the commodity boards. JACRA is more concerned with collecting cess and self-imposed obstacles than the facilitation of export of the crops under its portfolio. It’s to be noted that under the defunct system, cocoa production in 1994 was 2,400 tons of dry beans and in 2022/23 the amount was 63 tons. This dismal situation is even worse for sugar, coffee, banana, pimento, all of which were shepherded by the cooperatives management system guided by commodity boards with well-trained specialists.

The demise of these specialists jolted the flow of research findings from research centres like universities and other facilities (Bodles) to farmers and agricultural interest groups. This disruptive disconnect gave rise to the prominence of agricultural input suppliers to treat with farmers in many instances to sell their products for financial gains as their primary goal without guidance from Government extension agencies nor research bodies.

Cooperatives were the management system through which the commodity boards operated and JAS acted as the holding entity for these boards. This system galvanised community support through JAS branches which selected most agricultural produce from farmers and marketed them on behalf of the farmers with consistently prompt payment.

The dismantling of this community-based approach saw the decline of entities like the Christiana Potato Growers Association, People’s Co-op Bank (PC Bank) and many dairy farms in addition to sugar, coffee, banana, cocoa, pimento, leaving the floodgate open for food importation replacing the lost domestic food production because Government failed to institute workable policies to keep our farmers producing both domestic and traditional crops. Even with the current existence of entities like AIC, Development Bank of Jamaica (DBJ) and Jampro, there is no proper policy structure to create any meaningful improvement in agricultural production.

Different sectors of our society are still at loggerheads on this issue of food production and food security, with Jamaica’s food import bill reaching as high as US$1.2 billion in 2023 (and still climbing) with no clear policy nor programmes on how to move agricultural production back to pre-Independence levels. The Government has, over the last two decades, supported Irish potato and onion production through targeted financial assistance to farmers, but storage and distribution have not yet been addressed in any structured way to protect these farmers from massive post-harvest loss.

RADA must be credited for the manner they managed these programmes in tandem with the parent ministry. It’s imperative that other crops and livestock be included in this targeted government support with emphasis on the traditional crops, especially in the area of infrastructural development, irrigation and research. In fact, JAS stand ready to take a lead role in the resuscitation these crops and livestock.

It’s important to note here that agricultural companies engaged in contract farming use a hybrid co-operative management system in their operations where the inputs are supplied to the farmers with extension services and functions like slaughtering, cold storage, packaging and marketing being done by these companies. These functions are critical to subsectors like poultry and pig farming to ensure that gains made in efficient feed conversion and other husbandry practices are not lost in functions such as slaughtering, etc.

The replacement entities like RADA and JACRA are not vested with this co-operative-like management system and the co-operative and friendly societies are more linked to the Companies Office of Jamaica regulating operations of foundations, etc, rather than being fused with the agricultural entities to gain greater efficiency and economies of scale in their production processes.

The JAS is currently working with the co-operative and friendly societies to find a congenial management system that can be used to create wealth for farmers whilst making food affordable to consumers. We anticipate that the reform of the co-operative laws and regulations will become less bureaucratic and more user friendly.

Jamaica, at Independence, inherited many progressive systems but successive governments pulled them up without developing workable alternatives and now we are experiencing decline in every subsector, with a dim future ahead. There are a few bright spots offered by some purveyors and higglers, but they are not linked to the production of the commodities where financial assistance and other inputs generally flow as an advance to the farmer, as is the case with contact farmers in the broiler industry. Besides, important elements such as storage are limited to the most economically buoyant farmers, with even the private marketers unable to afford proper storage, except those companies involved in the so-called hybrid co-op system.

The Government needs to replace the structures that impede the facilitation of the togetherness of our farmers through strategic storage and appropriate transportation with cost-sharing between farmers, it needs to reform cooperative and friendly society legislation and it needs to arm agricultural agencies with the tools to create and operate more of a cooperative-type management system.

In light of the foregoing, the JAS is calling on the AIC to desist from clouding the AMC transaction in secrecy and to reveal why the facility is being taken away from our farmers, as well as to whom will it go, what will it be used for and — if it is sold — will the proceeds used to create a comparable replacement at a strategic site.

The agricultural sector produced approximately 800,000 tons of food stuff in 2021/22 mostly from domestic crops and although total production declined in 2023 due to unfavourable weather, growth is forecast for 2024. Besides, agriculture contributes 8 per cent of GDP from over 250,000 registered farmers, but the sector deserves better interns of public information and a bigger share of Government allocation among other things.

There is much to be done now. Rapid modernisation of every aspect of agriculture must be tackled, special incentives to attract young people must be formulated and introduced, equipment for lease and affordable financing must be made available to farmers, clear government policies, well communicated(through public education) must be arrived at to dent food importation.

With the right approach, we can significantly improve both production and consumption of quality local produce — with quality of life improvement and other benefits for all.