CABINET has approved the lease of the Wallens Dairy Farm, located east of Linstead, St Catherine, to the Beef and Dairy Producers Association of Jamaica (BDPAJ), the agriculture ministry said yesterday.

The lease, which extends over 25 years, is intended to facilitate the establishment of a Northern St Catherine Dairy Cluster to enable the re-entry into the industry of at least 60 smallscale farmers who would be invited to each lease a maximum of 10 cows to the farm for corporate management, the ministry said.

“Wallens Dairy will be one component of a proposed development by BDPAJ to increase local fresh milk production through the participation of small-scale farmers as equity owners, deriving greater benefits from the value chain,” the release added.

The Wallens Farm, comprising 250 acres will be intensively managed as a semizero grazing system, employing the total mixed ration (TMR) feeding strategy to a herd of 625 cows. Annual output is projected at approximately two million litres of milk.

“Wallens will form one component of a vertically integrated network, in which the Century Dairy Processing operations at Old Harbour will form the hub for the processing and marketing of milk,” the ministry said.

A recent agreement between the Jamaica Dairy Farmers Federation, its owners, and BDPAJ has led to the formation of a joint venture company which will assume responsibility for the management of the Century Dairy in addition to overall responsibility for the management of the cluster farms.

According to the agriculture ministry, the BDPAJ proposes to invest in the recapitalisation of the Wallens Farm. This investment will be partially offset by a write-down on the annual lease over the first 10 years of the project.

Project implementation is expected to commence within four to six months.