Dear Editor,
A RECENT release from the Ministry of Agriculture informed that Minister Noel Holder met with a team from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) to discuss possible funding of agricultural projects. Among the projects indicated was a revitalization of the local dairy industry.

The minister’s “determination to restore Guyana’s dairy industry” is grounded in his claim that “what was once a lucrative industry is now almost non-existent.”

That there was ever a lucrative dairy industry at the national level is an outrageous fallacy. Admittedly, yeoman and very costly efforts, along with some tendentious policies, were put in place between the 1970s and 1980s to enable the sector to be on a firm footing in the context of national food self-sufficiency and food and nutrition security. Among those efforts were LiDCo’s flagship enterprise at Moblissa: the 4,000-acre nuclear dairy farm (which never had even 400 milkers) which was complemented by 25 private satellite farms (each of 50 acres); its smaller gold-digging operation at Blairmont rounded out its primary milk sources. Its Georgetown Milk Pasteurization Plant, for the most part, produced composite products: blends of locally produced fresh milk and re-constituted milk from imported skimmed milk powder and butter fat.

As part of its diversification programme of the 1980s, GuySuCo established dairy enterprises at Liliendaal and Versailles, which also produced secondary milk products; the life of these entities was very ephemeral.

Also during the 1980s, the Saint Stanislaus College Dairy Unit was established, with substantial inputs from IICA, as an intensive, mechanized, model for small farmers to emulate.

The National Dairy Development Programme also supported the numerous small farm milch cow units across the coastal belt, initially through the establishment of fenced forage plots for zero-grazing, and soon after, with its artificial insemination programme (based on imported semen from bulls of high genetic merit).

As the end of the 1990s approached, all of these noble efforts had gradually petered out because of failure to overcome the myriad challenges impacting low productivity, technical inefficiencies, high production costs, and the lifting of import restrictions.

The productivity challenges revolved around the complex interactions of animal genetics and environmental factors. Emphasis had always been placed on grade Holsteins. This temperate breed in our relatively constant high ambient temperature/high humidity environment would have experienced severe limitations in expressing its genetic potential for milk production, growth and reproduction due to the interplay of climate, nutritional factors (quality and quantity of feedstuffs), diseases and parasites.

As a consequence of changes in government policies, e.g. trade liberalization from the dawn of the 1990s, a flood of cheap imports, including milk powder and milk products, became available to local consumers. This basically was the death knell of the fledgling dairy industry.

Is Government now willing to reinstate tariffs and import restrictions to facilitate the development of a lucrative dairy sector, especially after the social maelstroms of the 1970s and 1980s? Also, will lower yielding milch breeds which will better tolerate the challenging environmental stressors be prioritized this time around, although the costs for establishment of the necessary infrastructure are virtually similar for the temperate types? Can a poor developing country really produce milk and its by-products at competitive prices vis-a-vis the landed cost from the behemoths of international dairy trade (North America, New Zealand and the EU)?

Alternatively, should our limited financial and human resources not be channelled into maximizing the production of those commodities for which we have a competitive advantage, especially since bovine milk production is biologically one of the most inefficient means of protein production for human consumption?

Perhaps the time is overdue for establishment of a multi-disciplinary planning division in the Ministry of Agriculture, which can holistically and competently address developmental initiatives.

Yours faithfully,
VERNON MC PHERSON