THE GUYANESE FARMING community as well as its forest products sector would undoubtedly have been encouraged by last week’s announcement that Trinidad and Tobago has finalised a new trade accord with Guyana for increased importation from this country of agricultural and forest products. This is the kind of development partnership that could inspire faith in the regional single market of our Caribbean Community, and arrest the cynicism and doubts about member governments’ commitment to the integration movement.

Guyana has long been perceived as the potential ‘breadbasket’ of this region. Indeed, it had been so identified, along with Belize, by the late William Demas, Elder Statesman among CARICOM’s development economist, as the potential “breadbasket” within our Community.

It was, therefore, no surprise when, in allocating portfolio responsibilities among Heads of Government for CARICOM’s quasi-cabinet, the President of Guyana was tasked with the specific responsibility for ‘Agriculture and Agricultural Diversification’, with Food Security as a core feature.

In addressing last November’s World Food Summit in Rome, organised by the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO), President Bharrat Jagdeo mounted a strong lobbying effort for that UN agency to be more proactive in supporting this region’s initiatives in the vital agricultural sector.

The FAO would be aware, as CARICOM governments themselves are, of the very valuable contributions of the region’s agricultural sector in providing direct and indirect employment; foreign exchange; and in encouraging citizens to consume more of what’s produced within CARICOM.

Last week, in the context of renewed efforts by Guyana to encourage Community partner States to purchase more of their agro-exports from this country, and help in the general effort to reduce dependency on food imports, GINA reported in a press statement: “Intense efforts by the Ministry of Agriculture to increase fresh agricultural and forest products exports to Trinidad and Tobago have resulted in the finalisation of a ‘Trade Protocol’ between the two countries which paves the way for a number of additional agro-commodities to gain entry to the twin-island republic…”

Signing the agreement with his Trinidadian counterpart was Agriculture Minister, Robert Persaud.

According to the GINA release, the list of commodities that would now be eligible for export to Trinidad and Tobago, consistent with the terms and conditions outlined in the Protocol, has increased from six to 26.

It is to be hoped that other CARICOM countries will seek to emulate the approach by Trinidad and Tobago in encouraging importation of more of their agricultural and forest products from Guyana and, by so doing, contribute to a significant reduction of the Community’s current estimated five billion dollars (US$5 billion) food imports from foreign countries.