THE local office of the Inter American Office for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) has reported that it has completed value chain analyses of cassava and small ruminants production in Guyana.

The understanding gained will enable the Institute to make firm recommendations to the European Union (EU) funded Agriculture Policy Program (APP) for follow-up actions which will help locals make significant improvements to the productivity and profitability of these farming activities, IICA’s National Value Chain Facilitator (NVCF) Selwyn Anthony disclosed earlier this week.
Anthony disclosed that the work done was part of a series of value chain analyses of agricultural produce which has been on-going from late last year in fourteen other CARIFORUM member states, the aim being to help small farmers throughout the Region to develop viable agricultural systems and to enhance the regional and interregional capabilities of the agricultural sectors in eradicating poverty.
The APP programme is being executed by the IICA with the Caribbean Agricultural Research and Development Institute (CARDI) and the CARICOM Secretariat as partners.
The value chain analysis of cassava and small ruminants production in Guyana had been requested by the Government of Guyana under the auspices of the APP programme which is being funded under the 10th European Development Fund (EDF).
The IICA was specifically responsible locally and regionally for improving market linkages of producers.
Anthony said the value chain analyses involved extensive field work in all ten Administrative Regions in Guyana with himself and team exploring and examining all the issues and challenges faced by farmers in cassava and small ruminants production in getting their products from farm to markets and utilisation by consumers.
“In our analyses, we had to understand all the production issues, all the technology transfer issues, all the marketing issues, the consumer reaction to what they were being offered, the opportunities and the threats.”
The study had been done in close collaboration with local agencies such as the New Guyana Marketing Corporation, the National Agricultural Extension Institute (NARI) the Guyana Livestock Development Authority (GLDA) and other value chain actors such as producer groups and individual cassava and small ruminants farmers, hotels restaurants and supermarkets owners and even land water and air transport providers of agricultural produce.
The team interviewed agro processors and representatives of capacity building institutions such as the University of Guyana and the Guyana School of Agriculture (GSA).
The analyses also looked at ways in which funding can be obtained for the targeted cassava and small ruminant farmers to meet their needs for finance to secure sales, to buy inputs or produce, or to improve efficiency.

Anthony said that the “chain actors” supplied information willingly since they were all convinced that the analysis would lead to some desirable changes in the production and productivity and overall profitability of the two agricultural activities.
The value chain analyses being completed, he said, the penultimate stage is to present the findings to all the stakeholders who were involved.
The related event, a National Validation and Pre Capacity Building Workshop, is scheduled for the next ten days at a venue to be announced.
The final stage of the work done is for the validated report and its recommendations to be passed on by the IICA, to CARDI for the provision of appropriate technology transfer inputs and to the CARICOM Secretariat which will work on the provision of an enabling policy environment for the cassava and small ruminant farmers.
Anthony said that the full impact of the studies on the targeted farmers will be felt in another year or two from now.
“We will see some changes because this information is going to be fed into CARDI who will be willing to make some of the varietal changes and technology transfer activities that we will be recommending, and then we see CARICOM doing work on some of the policies in order to make the improved status of these activities happen for the benefits of small farmers here, particularly women and youths.”

By Clifford Stanley