NEW FOREST, Manchester — Agriculture Minister Floyd Green has reiterated that scallion farmers here facing a glut in their produce are to continue receiving well-needed support through a public-private partnership to help move the massive yield.

“It has started, so we are now moving scallion out of the New Forest agro park. In fact, since [last] week, GraceKennedy Group took out about 50,000 pounds of scallion. Today [Sunday], the ministry has a public-private intervention where we are providing the transportation for the scallion and we are partnering with Walkerswood,” he told journalists on Sunday in New Forest, Manchester.

“We are going to be buying 125,000 pounds of scallion over this week so that we can ease the burden. We have also secured an additional 200,000 pounds of scallion to be bought by other private companies. In total, we are doing an intervention of about 600,000 pounds over these two weeks. We think that will significantly ease the burden on our farmers and get them to invest again as we move forward,” added Green.

Just over a week ago, Member of Parliament for Manchester Southern Peter Bunting, a member of the Opposition People’s National Party, raised concerns over the low demand and spoilage of scallion affecting scores of farmers in the agriculture belt in New Forest during a tour of the area.

Green said he understands the challenges facing farmers and has made connections with agro-processors to assist.

“We are seeing excellent production, but as you can imagine, without the sales the farmers tend to really be faced with a difficult situation, that is why we have intervened from our ministry. So, weeks ago, before all of the excitement, we called in our main agro-processors to see what the issue was and how we could help,” he said.

“Grace indicated that they had almost three years in stock and a downturn in demand, and as such they had reduced their buying numbers. We brought in Walkerswood and we crafted an intervention programme,” he added.

He credited the farmers for their resilience six months after their fields were flooded and battered by Category 5 Hurricane Melissa.

“One of the good things we have seen since Hurricane Melissa is a tremendous recovery, especially in our agro-parks, and the reason we are seeing that recovery is because we have taken definitive steps to help the farmers get back on their feet,” he said.

“One of the things we did in this New Forest agro park is not just to provide the irrigation water, but to remove the cost of that water, so the farmers got the water free up to the end of February, and that has led to significantproduction numbers, and what we are seeing out there is that the production numbers have outstripped the demand,” he added.

GREEN…in total we are doing an intervention of about 600,000 pounds of scallion (Kasey Williams)