Region Five model farm developing rapidly
─ crops-livestock integration approach being followed
─ income already being earned from vegetables and cash crops sales
─ construction of Piggery nearing completion
DPI, Guyana, Monday, October 8, 2018
The Regional Economic Developmental Programme for Region Five (Mahaica/Berbice) is developing a crops-livestock integration approach as well as agro-processing systems.
According to Regional Executive Officer, Ovid Morrison, the project was launched earlier this year on state lands leased to the Regional Administration by the Mahaica Mahaicony Abary/Agricultural Development Authority (MMA/ADA), at Naarstigheid West Coast Berbice (WCB) in 1992 for agricultural purposes.
He disclosed that the model farm is being executed in three phases over a thirteen-year period as finances are provided.
“We are now in year one of phase one and we would have two more years to complete phase one. The second of the five-year phase will focus on agro-processing so that at the end of our first phase and into the second phase when we will have completed five years our coconut industry will be ready and our pig industry and poultry industry will be fully developed and ready for markets, both locally and regionally,” he said.
He disclosed that construction of the first of two piggeries which will house scores of hogs is nearing completion.
Morrison said that during the thirteen years of its duration, the project will be able to provide training for local farmers and students on the scientific methods of agricultural production which can provide employment for people who desire to be self-employed and have a greater pride in agriculture.
The model farm, he stressed, will demonstrate the use of integrated farming systems such as those in which waste products from crops and animals can serve as fertilizer or feed for fish and pigs and the water can be used as fertilizer for crops in a cycle, which will make the farm almost completely self-reliant in the required inputs for cheap but highly productive agricultural production.
The farm will soon demonstrate how waste, from the crops or livestock, can be integrated into other elements of the farm.
The farm is already earning income from sections which have been cultivated.
Morrison had earlier disclosed that the Model Farm project was in response to a charge, by President David Granger, for the region to craft a Plan of Action for Regional Development (PARD).
Story and Image: Clifford Stanley.