MEMBERS of the Co-operative Society at  #5 Village, West Coast Berbice and other West Berbicians are calling on the Mahaica/Mahaicony/Abary Agricultural Development Authority (MMA/ADA) to undertake urgent land reform in that and neighbouring villages, in order that their holdings can be utilised for large-scale  agricultural activities.

Mr. Earl Morris, Chairman of the Co-op, disclosed recently that the historical alignments of agricultural lands in #5 and the neighbouring villages of # 3 and # 4 have stifled agricultural production and deprived residents of the means of improving their quality of life in the villages.
He explained: “This is an age-old problem in that, historically, the lands in these villages were surveyed and laid out to run in a north-to-south direction. The problem here is that, as a result of this alignment, (the lands) run parallel to the drainage and irrigation system. So a plot of land in the middle of the village cannot access either the drainage or irrigation facility.”
He added: “In fact, only plots of land at the eastern end of the villages can get irrigation, and they can get only irrigation, and not drainage. The plots of land at the western end of the villages can get drainage, but not irrigation.”
He added that the only access residents could get was along their narrow strips of land, and any other means of access would involve trespassing on the lands of others.
Morris disclosed that, as a result, large tracts of prime agricultural lands remain unused, and residents who could have put them to productive use and improve the quality of their lives have no alternative but to leave the villages and seek their fortunes elsewhere.
He stressed: “This alignment of these lands is a historical inheritance, but it has led to a dire situation in terms of the welfare and development of the current generations of villagers”.
Morris said that solution to the problem is known to be realignment of these lands from their current north-to-south alignment to an east-to-west alignment, to make the lands run, for example, parallel to the West Berbice Highway one behind the other to depths of up to a few miles inland.
This would mean that the lands would be situated at right angles to the drainage and irrigation system, rather than parallel, as now obtains; so that irrigation can be accessed at one end of the plot and drainage at the other.
Achieving this would require surveys of the current land holdings which run north-to-south, and then applying the acreages to a new alignment of lands running from east to west, a land administrative function which is the task of the MMA/ADA.
This, Morris said, would be a highly welcome development for the people in the villages of # 3, # 4 and # 5; and would give them opportunity to do productive things, like rice cultivation on their own plots, growing cash crops, planting fruit trees, and generally improving the quality of their lives”.
He also disclosed that, due to a long “period of limbo” in the realignment of these lands, transports and other forms of titling had been long withheld.
Realignment of the lands would make it possible for residents to get titles, and to use those titles as collateral for other economic activities, which could only lead to poverty reduction and generation of wealth.
He said there had been a ray of hope for the villages in question in the early nineteen nineties, when the MMA/ADA actually started surveys with a view to realigning the lands; but within a few months, for reasons still unknown, the effort fizzled out and has since seemed to have been abandoned.
“This matter affects the welfare, wellbeing and development of a large group of people, and we are hoping that this will be recognized and attempts made to revive the process of land realignment,” he said.
He envisions a programme in which the MMA would survey the current land holdings, measure them, and give land owners the equivalent sized plots in land aligned east to west.
The MMA would also give titles to land owners at the end of the exercise, thereby relieving them of the bondage of the historical alignments which date as far back as 1895.
Morris disclosed that the newly resuscitated # 5 Village Co-operative will be discussing matters of its indebtedness to the MMA/ADA for starters, and will be reiterating its call for a realignment of the agricultural lands of the three villages, so as to make these lands economically viable.