 Agriculture on the move! Agriculture on the move! Agriculture on the move! Agriculture on the move! Agriculture on the move! Agriculture on the move! Hello everyone and welcome to the program Agriculture on the Move. I am Philippe Sidney, your host. The banana industry. Yes, the same banana industry. Green gold, as it was called, contributed meaningfully to our GDP, to our economy, the hard-working farmers benefitted, and the list of persons benefitted and organizations benefitted. Today we are having a frank discussion on the future of the banana industry. And to help me in that discussion is the Minister responsible for Agriculture, the Honorable Alfred Prospe. Welcome to the program sir. Good afternoon and it's a pleasure for me to be here to discuss bananas. Yes, bananas. Mr. Minister, I never thought that one day you and myself would be having a discussion at that level when it came to the banana industry. But then it's serious and we need to address it. We need to let the farmers know and the public know what is happening to the banana industry and its future. You led the delegation to England a few weeks ago. Can you tell us why or the objective of that visit? This visit was very, very critical for us as a country because on the 40th of July this year, when I became the new Minister for Agriculture, the first correspondence I got on my desk was a letter coming from Fives, one of our biggest buyers in the UK of our bananas, indicating to us that they were not happy with the quality and production of our bananas getting to the UK. And that they were indicating to us in a very serious way that as of next year, January, February, they may not be signing a contract with St. Lucia to buy our bananas. When I saw this, I was really disturbed and I began discussions with persons involved in the banana sector as to the way forward. Two weeks ago, we led a delegation because we felt that we needed to deal with this problem very, very urgently and we decided to go to the UK to engage our supermarkets. And while there, we had a discussion with Sinsbury, which is our largest market. We also had discussions with Sinsbury, a ripening facility company called Fives. We also engaged with Waitrose, which is a smaller company which buys and purchases between 2,000 to 3,000 boxes a week. And we also engaged their ripening facility, Prima. And every single meeting we had with those key stakeholders was about quality of the St. Lucia bananas. I was really shocked when I heard from Fives and Sinsbury in particular that they did not need St. Lucia bananas to survive. They indicated to us very clearly that we were getting bananas of a higher quality from countries like Ghana, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominic and Republic. So we do not need your bananas. And just imagine what we knew bananas was for us many, many years ago. Our bananas were called green gold. Our bananas were considered to be the sweetest in the world. And we had preferential treatments for St. Lucia bananas. But it has gotten to the point where the UK supermarkets as seen did not need St. Lucia bananas. Now let's imagine our banana industry collapsed as a result. The negative consequences we have on our farmers, the families of those farmers, our country as a whole. Because you're talking more than 600 persons currently still involved in banana production. That is going to be a serious blow to the agricultural sector that I am responsible for. So I am facing a serious challenge that must be addressed as soon as possible. So it was a timely opportunity to go into England to really sit with those persons and to find out what's happening. But a good thing that is going for us, there is still an opportunity with Waitrose indicating to us that we are still willing to purchase from you by end of March, April, providing that an effort is made to address the quality issues. Now you tell me we have so many persons in the banana industry and yet those persons are spending time on the farm. They are spending money. They are paying labor. And at the end of the day when you expect them to make money out of all their hard work, they are getting zero. Because I was also surprised to know that our bananas very often, before it gets to the UK, they are all ripe. But there is a process where when the bananas get to the UK, it must go for the ripening facility for at least five to seven days before it gets to the market shelves. Now if our farmers wants to make money, they must see this banana industry as a profit making venture, as a business. And the same thing that Fives and Waitrose are saying to us, they are in this banana industry not to just see we buying bananas from St. Lucia because St. Lucia is a small country and we want to assist our farmers. They are saying to us it is a business. It's about making money. And this is why I want to appeal to our farmers that they need to view this whole banana sector and agriculture as a whole, not just a hobby, but as a business. I want to see them make money from agriculture. I want to see them make a profit from agriculture. I want to see that they continue to benefit from that sector which has been so good to them many decades ago. I mean this sector has caused our children to go to university. It has caused our farmers to purchase FIA vehicles. It has caused our farmers to build homes. It has caused our farmers to improve their infrastructure on their farms. It has been responsible for the economic development of St. Lucia. And when you go to the UK and you are hearing that kind of negative information which regards to our St. Lucia bananas, it hurts me because I used to be a banana farmer. I used to be in bananas. And all they are saying is the market in the UK requires a certain level of quality and consistency. And if St. Lucia is not ready to meet those requirements, they will just not be able to make business with us as a country. But I know we have some serious farmers who are serious about quality, who understand the value of producing quality fruits. But we have some of them out there who seem to be thinking, I can just put any bunch, any banana in the box and at the end of the day it will sell. This is not the case. Two or three farmers can mess up the livelihoods of 20, 30, 40 farmers. And so we have to deal with this problem. If it is one challenger before me now, it's to ensure that we make this happen. But there is hope. There is still a little wind open for us to deal with the issues very, very quickly. Because lucky for us, we had ELSA. ELSA impacted the banana farmers. 75% of the banana plantations were destroyed and we are not selling. But just imagine, we had a situation where we did not have a disaster and farmers were now ready to harvest their fruits. I'm guaranteeing them, Sainsbury would not be purchasing our bananas at this time because they are concerned about quality issues. But I'm hoping that we can do what has to be done in terms of an action plan that can immediately allow us to address those issues. But it's not just about an action plan that will say, between now and the next four weeks, we hope to see quality. And beyond that, it gets back to the same. It must be about quality, production and consistency. Right now, based on our discussion, what we saw is Sainsbury has no trust in St. Lucia bananas. And when somebody does not trust his friend and does not trust his wife and does not trust his husband, there is a problem. Big problem. So we have to deal with that trust and to do what we have to do as a country, as a ministry, as a government to ensure that we deal with the issues and deal with it quickly. One of our major problems, we knew what Winfresh was responsible for in terms of marketing our bananas. Winfresh collapsed in August last year. So now the NFT is responsible for exports. But NFT, as we all know, has its own challenges in terms of governance, in terms of its structure and so on. But we have to deal with this because if we are saying to NFT now, you are the sole banana export for St. Lucia, we have to ensure that we work closely with them to ensure that we deal with the issues. We address the issues so NFT will be in a state of readiness to ensure that we continue to sell to the UK. The good thing that is going for us is that we engage the guest line. That is our main shipping agency for the export of our bananas to England. And they have guaranteed us that the shipping line is still available for us. But there is a major issue of concern to me and I think it's a concern to our farmers that the length of time it takes from St. Lucia to the UK is 21 days. Unlike before I was told it was 14. Now if you're telling me that our foods have to be on the ocean between St. Lucia and UK for 21 days, then it has to leave the ship to the ripening facility. You're talking for weeks. When you go and you put in bananas that are from out here or has passed that stage, it will rip. And we will not solve the problem. So I want to appeal to our farmers that they need to understand that it makes no sense trying to have as 50 bunches of bananas as against 20 that is ideal for export. And at the end of the day, you assume that you're going to make more money by putting the overripe, over mature fruits in the park. But yes, you get zero for it. When it gets to the UK, it is dumped and it has to be paid for. So this is a very serious issue. But from the time I saw that letter, I began working and in discussion with my ministry head, my ministry officials, we said something must be done. And we began to work on a strategy. And the strategy is basically to really tell us, ask ourselves a few questions. Where are we now in this banana industry? Where are we? Are we where we should be? Are we where we want to be? But the second question is where do we want to go? Exactly. But you cannot decide where you want to go unless you make a determination as to how you want to get there. And set timelines to it. So we've begun that process and we're going to continue that process. We have engaged through the cabinet of ministers, an individual to do a consultancy to look at the operations of NFTU. In terms of ensuring that NFTU is at the level where it will be able to take on that challenge of the marketing, including giving support to farmers in terms of farm inputs, in terms of the extension services that are required to the farmers, engaging the farmers in terms of reaching out to them to emphasize the importance of quality. Hold that point, we'll do for our break. You're watching Agriculture in the Move. Stay tuned, we will be back soon. Don't go away. For effective chemical treatment of BlackSigaToker, practice routine preventative maintenance of all tools and equipment, especially the mist blower, to ensure proper functioning. Clean sprayer after use and service the machine regularly, as recommended by the manufacturer. Whenever you are using pesticides to control BlackSigaToker disease, personal protection and safety measures must be followed. Spray operators must always wear proper protective gear. Before or when handling pesticides, put on your overalls, respirator, goggles, boots and gloves to avoid contact with the skin, inhalation and ingestion of pesticides. For more information on how to treat and control BlackSigaToker on your farm or in your backyard garden, contact the BlackSigaToker Management Unit at 451-5091-451-5894 or email BPMU at canvw.lc. This message is brought to you by the Ministry of Agriculture in collaboration with the International Cooperation and Development Fund of the Republic of China on Taiwan. Welcome back to the program, Agriculture on the Move. Of course with me is the Honorable Alfred Prosper, the Minister responsible for the banana industry. And of course we are having a frank conversation as to the future of that industry. Mr. Minister, you spoke about getting, looking at the management of NFTO. That is crucial because at the end of the day, as you said, NFTO will be responsible for buying and also the selection and shipping of the bananas. So they need to get themselves prepared and they also need to get their farmers ready to ensure that the quality is maintained. How soon is that going to happen? Because I think you have a very small window of opportunity. This is the main challenge for us now to ensure that we get NFTO at a level where it is prepared to undertake that. But you cannot do undertake this without money. And currently NFTO is in a financial crisis and the government has been considering giving NFTO some level of assistance, financial resources, because obviously they have to get the boxes and the rope and everything for the farmers. Farmers need the fertilizer because it is one thing to preach quality. But if the farmers are not able to get the fertilizer, the nutrients, to address the soil issues, to, you know, fertilize on time and to be able to deliver the black so-called so-called problem, we have a problem. But also internally, we remember, you remember what happened recently when the last government, you know, wanted to give support financially to NFTO, but they were saying that they wanted to have a director appointed by the government and so on. But currently the structure of NFTO is about directors that are elected or selected by farmers. And those directors may not have the capacity to be able to manage the entity in terms of financing, marketing and all of that. So NFTO now needs to review its own internal structure in terms of, yes, are we prepared to take on this business and take on this challenge, to understand the importance of it and bring in a manager, bring in a serious accountant, to be able to manage the finances that government is prepared to provide. So it is very important that we do that because it becomes now the loan that's the only entity now that we have replacing Winfresh. Before we had Winfresh, we had NFTO, but now we have NFTO. But it's even more important for NFTO to collaborate even more closely with the BPIP, which is supposed to be focusing on quality and production. And I could not understand why these two entities were not working together. You have an entity responsible for export. You have another BPIP, I would want to call it, responsible for production and quality, but yet they don't talk. We must stop it. We must deal with it. And it is something that must happen because this thing is so sensitive that you cannot have stakeholders all over the place. They must come together as one. Because the main objective is about the industry, it's about our export, it's about ensuring that our farmers continue to make money to take care of themselves from this industry. And so the consultancy that cabinet has approved for intervention in terms of understanding and getting the general idea as to what's happening in NFTO has commenced. And we hope that in the next few weeks, a report will come out in terms of making recommendations in terms of the way forward for NFTO. But we need to look at the bigger picture in terms of the strategy to continue the strategy. And we have given a commitment that the strategy will be completed in time for marketing. And Sainsbury Fives are heavily dependent on this strategy for them to begin. Not purchasing from us, engaging us in talks. So what is it that they want to get from you all for them to decide, yes, you all are ready and you all are ready for shipment? One, the trust is not there. And it's not one where every time we are saying, we will do this. We are going to do it, but it's never done. They want to see that some action, urgent and serious action is being taken. And this is not just about writing a strategy on people. They want to know that we are engaging the farmers. They want to know that we are giving the support to the farmers in terms of farm inputs. They want to know that the NFTO is structured. They want to know that on the ground they can see that our farmers are ready to provide them the quality requirements that the market requires. And so in the coming weeks, the farmers will be seeing me engaging them in collaboration with NFTO and BPIP to really get that message to them that if you are in this business, it cannot be about a hobby. It must be about quality. Now, we need to look at the banner, view the banner industry in terms of its future. We are based on my knowledge. I can tell there are farmers who are unable to get to the quality standards that the UK market requires. We may have to consider those farmers going towards the regional market. There's a big market regionally. Regionally. And we have to look at ways or find ways where we can get more countries like Trinidad and Tiga and Sendkits to buy our bananas. So aside Barbados and probably Trinidad for the time being, we can have other countries regionally buying our bananas. But we also need to sensitize our population in terms of increasing its use for bananas, local consumption of bananas. But we also have to be clear to those farmers who are not ready to meet the requirements of the UK market and to meet the requirements of the regional market that we may have to, we may have to, and it's a sad state, to transition them into other forms of production. Yeah, because quality is quality. Quality is quality. I don't think there should be a quality for the UK and a quality for the regional market because quality is quality standard. Standard is standard. And I'm saying this based on the fact that we have a number of our banana farmers who are not global gas certified. Right, yes. So if you are not, it means you are not at that level to be able to meet those standards that are required by the market. Right, right. But that will help now boost our diversification program to get a number of those farmers who cannot survive in a banana industry at the moment. Because it's a very high demand for cuckoo. Hotel Chocola purchases our cuckoo. I was able during my visit to engage an investor who wants to import from St. Lucia jelly coconuts, julimangos, breadnuts, avocado and hot peppers. So we may have to now transition those. Now, when you mention that farmers will tell you but how is he indicating to us we need to diversify, we need to go into other crops. But yet we have a problem with our market. So in saying this we need to ensure that the marketing board is repositioned to be able to buy the farmers produced. We cannot afford to depend on the hotels all the time. We cannot expect to depend. Because the marketing board was set up and established in November 1967 to buy all the produce and all the commodities that are produced by our farmers. So we have to make that happen to give farmers confidence in the sector. So when they invest on their land, they invest in the production of a particular crop, they have to be certain that when I'm ready for harvest I will sell and I will get a good price for my produce. We need at least two minutes to tell the farmers what they need to do to continue their industry. We need to engage these markets, the main markets that we have to buy our produce from this sector. We need to make sure that we have a good price for our produce so that we can make our businesses better. We need to make sure that we have a better quality and the best quality of our produce. That we can do. We need to make sure that we have a good price for our produce, even if we are not in the right position. We need to go company and buy from the companies and buy from the companies that are between 2,000 to 15,000 to less than 10,000 from now. If we are to buy from the industry, if we are to buy from the industry, then we need to invest in the industry. We need to make sure that we have a good price for our produce, we need to make sure that we have a good quality and the best quality to make our produce. If you are a big fan of the industry, you can do it. You can do it for 3-4 weeks. If you don't have a good business, you can't do it. It's more difficult to sell a lot of things. You can sell everything here. If you want to continue the industry, you have to have all the money for the business. If you want to continue the industry, you can do it. If you want to continue the industry, you can do it. If you want to continue your industry, you can do it. You can't do it because it's expensive. And then, if you come here, you'll be like me. If you come here, you'll be like me. But you don't have to go there. But we have problem with fresh, we have to do it with fresh. And as I said in the last video, if you are a farmer, you don't have to go to the farm to do it with fresh. You have to go to the farm to fix it, you have to do business. But when you come to the farm in a situation like this, you don't have to go to the farm. You just have to do NFTO. But NFTO is a support. And NFTO is the only way you can go to the farm if you are a farmer by NFTO. Confidence is there. If you come to the farm, the farm is part of NFTO. Quality is the most important thing. It's quantity. If we talk about quality, we have to do it all the time. Because we have to do it with confidence as an industrial. We have to make sure that we don't go to the farm if you are a farmer, you have to do it. If we don't talk about it, we don't go to the farm. But if you are a farmer, you have to solve your own problems. If you come to the farm to do NFTO, you have to look at how we can do it with sales. If you come to the farm to do NFTO, you have to do quality. If you come to the farm to do NFTO, you have to go to the minister, you have to go to the government to do it. But you have to go to the farm to fix it. To fix it. Because we don't have to do it with quality. Currently, we are doing it with our own confidence. We have to do it with quality. If we don't do it with quality, we have to do it with sales. We have to do it with business. We have to do it with money. Piedi, Minister Minis, after about your end, I need you to put some emphasis again on the farmers and of course, to a lot of solutions, you know, that women's business, the government's business. The government of the St. Louis Liberal Party inherited this problem. Because on the 40th of July, that was four days after we won the election. So that was a problem that existed before. But as a ministry, as a minister for agriculture, as a government, we have to deal with it. And this is why I'm not going back there. We have to move forward. And it is our objective and goal as a government to develop and establish this strategy, action plan, to ensure that we deal with this problem or address this problem as soon as possible. In the next week, we are going to... I'm putting forward a cabinet memo to the cabinet to establish a task force on bananas. And that task force will be responsible for looking at the UK market, looking at the regional market, looking at the local market and chatting that way forward for that industry to ensure that our banana industry is secured. Well said, Minister. I want to thank you for being here. And I can see the passion in you, you know. The farmers are watching you, eh? Yes, I know they are watching me. I want them to watch me, but I want them to ensure that they remember what was said today. Yes, right. And for that, and I would like them, I would urge them to focus on ensuring that we meet that objective. Thank you very much for being here, Sir. I wish you success. And thank you very much for... You've been watching Agriculture on the Move. Thank you for viewing the program. And remember, agriculture is a business. And shoot it like that. Our banana industry is very, very close to our heart. And of course, the Minister and by extension of the government. Stay tuned for more information as we get them. I'm Philip Sidney. Goodbye.