I am responding to Mr. M. Jinnah Rahaman’s letter in KN Sunday 21 March, 2010 which was misleading and malicious in attacking the Guyana Agricultural Producers Association (GAPA) which is a legally registered non-governmental organisation which provides support to and represents the non-traditional commodities farmers (cash crop farmers). Further, GAPA wishes to emphatically state that the association was not resuscitated by any particular minister, but it was re-launched to further organise and develop the non-traditional agricultural sector. The GAPA will not tolerate any attempt by any individual to distort the efforts of the association to continue further development of the cash crop sector.
The GAPA noted with disgust the consorted attempt by a few individuals who are bent on discrediting the effort of the Minister of Agriculture and its agencies and create mischief by misleading farmers and others.
Further, I would like to remind Mr. Rahaman that farmers are intelligent people and cannot be easily fooled by his cheap attempt to gain attention with the propagation of misinformation regarding the progress of GAPA and the ever-increasing non-traditional agriculture sector.
However, the association is calling on all farmers to condemn such an attack by Jinnah Rahaman and to highlight the support and responsiveness extended by GAPA and other agencies from the Ministry of Agriculture.
Meanwhile, GAPA would like to recommit itself to serving non-traditional farmers to increase production and access to lucrative markets and not be distracted by the negative rhetoric by the likes of Jinnah Rahaman and others.