Increased agriculture & fisheries output for VI- Dr Dawson
Dr. Dawson was speaking in a post budget interview with government information officers.
Premier and Minister of Finance Dr the Honourable Natalio D. Wheatley (R7) presented a four hundred and eighty-eight million, six hundred and ninety-nine thousand, eight hundred and seventy-one dollars ($488,699,871.00) budget on Monday, November 11, 2024.
In his budget address the Premier said one of the lessons learned from 2024 is that “we must invest in, and promote advancement in sustainable agriculture and fisheries sectors, which are vital to reducing our need to import certain food products and ensuring food security and reduce our import bill to a sustainable level”.
He said investing in agriculture and fisheries would diversifies the VI’s economy while addressing food security needs.
Lands being made available for agriculture
Dr. Dawson said as part of plans to increase the VI’s output in agriculture and fisheries more lands are being made available for agriculture.
“We have programs right now that will allow the assignment of lands on Anegada, Virgin Gorda, Tortola, Jost Van Dyke. Currently there is a survey team deployed to Anegada to facilitate that process and Virgin Gorda will follow shortly after,” he revealed.
Once this is done, Dr. Dawson said immediate returns can be expected with the increase in agriculture output.
Water access paramount
Meanwhile, Dr. Dawson said with the expectation of an increase in agriculture output, access to water is important.
“That is part of our program, it’s well known that we have a project on the way to develop a reservoir at Paraquita Bay which will meet the needs of the farmers there but in addition to that we’ll be looking at a broader water policy and water processes to ensure water on the Territory,” he stated.
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7 Responses to “Increased agriculture & fisheries output for VI- Dr Dawson”
2. Why are we doing agriculture in Anegada where water shortage is a big issue. Soil quality is another concern.
3. Fisheries not sustainable in the long run. Consider the catches 20-30 years ago vs. today. Plus, nobody here would ever follow any sort of rules about seasonal limits.
4. It takes time for stuff to grow. Lots can happen during that time, so how does Dawson expect "immediate" returns?
5. How much is the “sustainable” bill of import projected to be? What is the target number? How was it derived?