TRELAWNY,Jamaica — Opposition spokesperson on agriculture, fisheries and mining Dr Dayton Campbell is accusing the Government of not doing enough to empower players in the agriculture sector.

Addressing a People’s National Party (PNP) conference for Trelawny Southern last Thursday night, Campbell spoke specifically of the importance of helping the yam belt that falls within the constituency as well as farmers across the country who have been impacted by Hurricane Beryl.

“South Trelawny is an agricultural constituency in this country. We’re realising that coming out of the hurricane that we have not seen sufficient attention being given to the farmers in South Trelawny. To be frank, we have not had sufficient attention given to the farmers in the entire country. You have in Jamaica over 200,000 people registered as farmers. It is the single-largest employer of labour in the country. There is much more that the Government needs to do to empower our farmers,” said Campbell, who is also general secretary of the PNP.

He made no reference to last month’s announcement in the House of Representatives by Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Mining Floyd Green that the Government was allocating $700 million to provide various forms of short-term assistance to farmers and fishers who suffered significant loss due to Hurricane Beryl.

Campbell did, however, contend that farmers in Trelawny Southern “don’t have proper access to get to their farms”. He said his comments were based on observations during a tour of the area alongside businessman Paul Patmore, who was presented as the party’s standard- bearer for the constituency during the conference.

According to Campbell, farmers are now forced to use donkeys to transport sticks to their farms because of the inadequate roads.

“People don’t give agriculture the primacy that it deserves, because somehow we think that agriculture is the dirty cousin in the family. And the reason why people think that way is that growing up, you see a man a struggle on a half acre of land, pon a quarter acre of land with machete and pick axe. Time come now to make land available to our farmers,” he charged.

The PNP general secretary also took issue with what he said is a lack of storage facilities for farmers.

“When hurricane a come them tell you go reap what you have. When you go and reap what you have there is no proper storage. How can you have yam country and have no proper storage for the people to ensure that when they reap their produce that they can store it. We want to ensure that we work with south Trelawny to bring proper storage facility in place so that when our farmers go out there and produce they can store their produce and get the maximum return from their labour,” Campbell said.

He also voiced strong support for farmers who are perennial victims of theft.

“For too long we have allowed the two-foot puss to rob our people from their hard work. For too long, we have allowed praedial larceny to deter people from going into agriculture. We must take a serious stance against praedial larceny to ensure that when you go out there and produce, when you raise your animals, that people don’t come like Nicodemus in the night and thief and gone with the [fruits of the] hard work that you have put in,” he expressed.

“And if they do so, we must ensure that we reclaim the proceeds of their crime so that we give you back a chance so that you can go back and produce again. So agriculture is a big thing for this constituency and for the next administration of the People’s National Party,” he added.

PNP President Mark Golding concurred that the agriculture sector is treated like a distant relative and reiterated that this would change under the PNP.

“The People’s National Party wants to uplift our farmers. No more poor cousin business for agriculture. Agriculture must be a mainstay of our economy, delivering well for our people, feeding our people and feeding other people outside of Jamaica who need what we have to offer here,” Golding said.

— Horace Hines