…Region Eight’s agriculture unit develops new substitute for cows

IT’S a new mineral block supplement and if Deputy Regional Executive Officer of Region Eight, Gavin Gounga and team have their way, cassava cultivation can be developed on a large scale to cater for the production of this innovative food supplement while giving birth to a major economic activity.

Gounga, who worked in the Potaro-Siparuni region for 14 years as an agricultural officer, before holding his current managerial portfolio at the regional administration, told the Guyana Chronicle, recently, that the new supplement has already been tried and tested.
He said based on the feedback received from cattle farmers at the village of Monkey Mountain where theory was put into practice at an agricultural exhibition back in 2017, the cassava mineral block supplement has been a hit to the cattle farming community there and if pursued, can add a higher economic value to the staple.

He explained that in 2017, along with Henaku Addo, Senior Livestock Officer at the Guyana Livestock Development Authority (GLDA) and another agricultural officer from the National Agricultural Research and Extension Institute (NAREI), the trio conceptualized the idea of finding a supplement for molasses. ”The idea was birthed right here at the Regional Admin building,” he noted. Addo is based primarily in hilly villages within sub-district two of the region.

Gounga said the idea evolved to the stage where they considered casareep, given its nutritional value as the ideal substitute for molasses.

Reality of casareep
Gounga explained that a bottle of casareep retails for $2500 but the food preservative only sells in large quantities around Christmas time since it is in demand for the famous Pepper Pot.

He noted that while that is a seasonal market, with production of the new casareep mineral block, it could become more commercially viable all year. ”We want to make casraeep a commercial product,” he said.

He said that since the sugar industry was being streamlined to cater for the less demands the world has for Guyana’s sugar, then the molasses production will drop. ”Then we have to find something else as a substitute,” he said.

Economic viability
Gounga said Region Eight farmers can capitalize on the idea of cultivating cassava on a large scale but he also noted that in the Rupununi, where cattle is reared on a larger scale and where there is also cassava cultivation, there can be increased cultivation of the staple to cater primarily for the mineral block supplement.

He noted that cattle is reared primarily for beef production and to get the animals to market size of around 300 pounds, a supplement is used to add to their weight. Here is where molasses usually comes into the fray, he said, noting it is used to hasten the process in the growth of the animals.

He said that locally, there are mineral block supplements which are imported into Guyana from Brazil and sold to farmers on the local market. ”We are trying to produce a mineral block that is made here,” Gounga said.

He said there is a plan to develop the product for wider use in the Potaro-Siparuni region. However, he noted that the region works within the confines of budgetary allocations. He said the next step would require an awareness campaign for farmers to grow more cassava and make casareep the primary product.
He explained that once it heads in that commercial direction, then the plan can become a reality.

Gounga said too that the Potaro-Siparuni region has the capacity to produce cassava in large quantities for the product to be made commercially viable.
Mineral content

According to research posted on the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) website, mineral blocks have been used mainly to supply nitrogen to improve rumen function, but have also been the means of delivering other nutrients, minerals or therapeutic substances to improve animal performance.

Research has shown that cassava tubers and hay are used globally as animal feed. Cassava hay is harvested three to four months when it reaches about 12 to 18 inches above ground.
It is sun dried until its final dry matter content approaches 85 percent. Cassava hay contains high protein and tannins and is an ideal source of roughage for cattle.

“It is not a probability anymore for me, it’s a possibility,”Gounga said of the new product, noting that a project has to be developed to grow the cassava in large quantities and a processing unit has to be constructed primarily for the mineral
“We have the blueprint here for this product. It is only for it to go into production,” Gounga said of his team’s idea.

“We can have this casareep Eldorado,” he said of the value of the product.”