A small farm on Virgin Gorda. Government has been urged to do more to assist local farmers. Photo: VINO/File

According to Mr Doug Wheatley, the Virgin Islands must think food security. Photo: VINO/File

Many local farmers are unable to have their produce compete with the prices of imported produce, which puts them at a severe disadvantage and sometimes out of business. Photo: VINO/File

Host of the radio programme Speak out BVI on ZBVI 780 AM aired Tuesday October 11, 2016 Doug Wheatley urged them to consider the significant role that the agricultural sector plays to the territory.

According to him, right now it is the feeling that the sector is not going to be a major factor in the Virgin Islands (VI) because the prices are not competitive.

“When a farmer produces his crops and he takes them to market the prices are a little higher than imported products and the consumer, by and large, will want to buy the stuff that is cheaper and more affordable and so the imported stuff is snapped up and the local stuff is not,” he noted.

“A lot of the produce that comes from the United States and Puerto Rico and Europe, the farmers are subsidised. Those countries believe that agriculture is important, food security is very, very important and therefore they provide subsidies to their farmers so that their farmers are able to export that stuff at a lower rate than what you can produce it for in the BVI.”

Mr Wheatley made reference to one point in time when the territory produced eggs for the local market, however, when the country began importing eggs which were cheaper than those locally produced, there was a switch and people started buying the imported eggs, resulting in the poultry farmers going out of business.

VI must think food security

“Now the BVI must also think of food security and the significance and importance of having an agricultural sector; it is not enough to say that the farmers who used to produce were older persons and now they are no longer able to do that because it is back breaking work and they are going out of it and agriculture is going to die,” he pointed out.

“There are still persons who are interested and young persons are interested in agriculture and would like to make a living out of agriculture and what they need is assistance from the government.”

Wheatley suggested that the assistance can be in the form of subsidies or if there is a problem with subsidies, contributions in kind can be made, for example making water available at no cost and perhaps the use of tractors.

“But help the farmer to keep his cost down then he would be able to produce his crops at a cheaper cost and then the consumer would be able to buy. That would be a plus because fresh food is much better than that which is coming from thousands and thousands of miles away, picked several days before…we must help our farmers! Put some money into agriculture and help the farmers who are out there struggling to keep agriculture alive.”

One of the callers to the programme said: “If we don’t get food from outside what’s going to happen?” Mr Wheatley responded: “We will have to end up eating leaves like some of the other countries.”