KINGSTON, Jamaica -The Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA) is encouraging interested individuals to consider becoming livestock officers.

Senior Livestock Specialist with RADA, Maxine Brown, told JIS News that currently there is only one livestock officer per parish.

“It can be quite challenging for the one officer to try to serve all the needs of the farmers and we understand, too, that the extension officers are under pressure. If they could even get an assistant, that would be great because agriculture is growing. As we grow and we start to expand, more persons are coming into the industry, as well as more investors. So, it becomes more and more pressuring,” she said.

In the recent interview with JIS News, Brown said from the side of the authority, there is a need to build out the livestock capacity in RADA.

“We want to ensure that we are getting adequate support to the farmers, because it can be challenging. I have been to workshops before with other countries and they have poultry specialists separate from their pig specialist, which are different from the small ruminant specialists,” she noted.

“Maybe these are some of the things that we may have to look into in the future – having specialised persons for different categories of livestock to give better focus to them,” she added.

Currently, livestock officers work in the field to help identify problems associated with animals and collect data on existing livestock.

–         JIS