REGION Two (Pomeroon/Supenaam) is certainly on the move, as development is evident in various areas, testimony of Government’s commitment to improving the lives of all its people.
Speaking recently to the Guyana Chronicle about some of these developments, Regional Chairman, Mr. Ali Baksh, touching on the area of non-traditional crops, said that right now the Pomeroon farmers are doing very good in the water coconut business.
The Pomeroon is considered to be the breadbasket of Guyana and the Caribbean.
He said they are receiving $30 for each water coconut and buyers are coming from the Caribbean.
He said there is also a local manufacturer who is bottling it in the Pomeroon and exporting it as well, with a life span of about six months, which augurs well for them.
“I understand people in Europe also are interested, and they are now negotiating with some other people,” he disclosed.
He said they are also selling dried coconuts coming out of the region with buyers coming from as far as North America, and they are buying dry coconuts at different prices.
“I think it is a good lucrative market out there now, and the farmers are tapping into that, “Baksh observed, adding that this is certainly attracting local and foreign manufacturers.
“I think they are progressing fairly good,” the Regional Chairman posited, adding that the same can be said about coffee and citrus.
Farmers are enjoying $30 for a water coconut and between $12 and $20 for a dried coconut.
“It is a big task we got because some are perishable. We are exporting non-traditional crops, at least, about ten truck loads a day is going to Georgetown, and that is going out of Guyana and it is also going to the local market even as far as Linden and Berbice,” he pointed out.
“I think the non-traditional crop is really and truly catching up not only in the Pomeroon area, but also in the coastal area,” he insisted.
He said currently, a businessman is putting up a very huge building in Charity not only for the processing of non-traditional crops but also the export of fish out of the region.
He reminded that the region have got the largest oil mill owned by the said businessman, not only selling it to the local market but exporting, too.
Turning to some other areas of development in Region Two, Baksh said they are right now extending some health post and educational facilities, including in the nine Amerindian areas.
The Regional Chairman underscored that they are now setting up solar panels in these areas.
He underscored that that more students from these indigenous communities are being given the opportunity to have access to secondary education especially in the Pomeroon area, which is important.
“I have always been saying, and I think this is one of my contention always that we have got tremendous amount of improvement in the health sector and in education, so much so that we have children now with seven, eight and nine subjects and a lot of them need jobs – that is a big problem,” he underscored.
“And that is why we want to encourage investors to come in because we got about 80 to 90 per cent of our rich resources – our maiden lands, untouchable,” he urged noting that the geographical logistics have always been an argument.
He said a lot of young people from the region are coming back from the University of Guyana with their diplomas and degrees, and they now have the technical institute established a couple of years ago so that “they can move on” to higher achievements.
He also reminded that there is the teachers training college right here and the distance education programme, too, and last year, the Guyana School of Agriculture was established on the coast.
“And we have students not only in Region Two but as far as Regions One (Barima/Waini), Three (Essequibo Islands/West Demerara), and Seven (Cuyuni/Mazaruni) who are attending this institute, and that is good because all three of these regions are very close and they are agriculture-based,” he noted.
He contended that all of these are very important in order to accelerate and expand development in the region.
Touching on rice, he said majority of the crop has already been reaped.
He said about 15 per cent of the farmers already went back to their land, while some five per cent have already sowed in low lying areas because of the rainfall being experienced.
He said farmers are already ploughing their lands, and are waiting for some more showers.
He said they are the regional administration are constructing culvert, bridges and other structures to facilitate farmers also during the reaping and sowing period, but have had to delay some of the projects to allow the farmers to bring out the paddy, and also those to prepare their lands.
Alluding to the intervention by the government to help farmers, he said that screening was done throughout the region and certain facilities were given to farmers through cash and kind, and that process is ongoing.
The Regional Chairman said that a fair amount of farmers lost their crops some “total loss and some did not to work on the field because of the shortage of water and so on”.
Also, the Government of Guyana, through the Ministry of Agriculture and the Region Two administration, has distributed seeds and planting materials to farmers in Siriki, Warapana and other villages in the Upper Pomeroon River.