One trade expert is warning that a failure to urgently boost food security in the Caribbean and Africa will result in a disaster of epic proportions in coming years.
This warning has come from Executive Director of the International Trade Centre (ITC) Pamela Coke-Hamilton, who also called on the Caribbean to move with haste in reducing its food import bill.
Raising concern about the region’s growing vulnerability to external shocks, Coke-Hamilton told delegates at the AfriCaribbean Trade and Investment Forum 2022 that “something is wrong in the way our global food system works”.
“Something is wrong with the continued commodity dependence in developing countries. We can no longer survive on the last rung of the value chain’s ladder,” she warned.
“If we don’t act now to boost food security, we will have a crisis of epic proportions on our hands. Here in the Caribbean we need to address the combined issue of hunger and nutrition. Our food consumption patterns in recent years have resulted in high levels of food imports,” she said.
With the region’s food import bill hovering around US$5 billion annually Coke-Hamilton said “The dependence on imports raises significant issues about food security.” She noted that the dependency on imports has also “ignited a silent pandemic of obesity and health-related issues”.
She raised concern that too often countries in the Caribbean and Africa were exporting products and earning negligibly when compared to the countries that were buying those products and producing value-added products that were then being sold back to the regions.
“I think we ought to be concerned,” said Coke-Hamilton.
“Valuable foreign exchange continues to seep through our hands while very little changes for the small-scale farmers whose hard work is not sufficiently compensated,” she said, as she singled out the African continent and its struggle with hunger.
Coke-Hamilton was addressing day two of the three-day event being held at the Lloyd Erskine Sandiford Centre under the theme One People, One Destiny: Uniting and Reimagining Our Future.
She said she welcomed the commitment by Caribbean Community (CARICOM) leaders to reduce the region’s food import bill by at least 25 per cent by 2025, saying it will require “all hands on deck”.
Noting that the region could count on the ITC for support, the former Caribbean Export executive urged authorities to put micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) at the heart of that initiative. It would also require increased digital connectivity for farmers and agribusinesses, making agriculture climate resilient and increasing access to finance to help MSMEs adapt and mitigate against climate change, she added.
“Increasing intra-regional trade can result in increased food security, but first it requires the development of an ecosystem to help African and Caribbean private sectors capitalise on market opportunities,” said Coke-Hamilton, who on Thursday reported that both regions had the potential to increase their trade with each other by up to US$1 billion over the next five years with the right actions and networks.
She also pointed to the need for countries to tackle issues relating to tariffs and “obstructive non-tariff measures” such as high transportation costs, and investing in better port and land freight infrastructure.
“We must take a holistic approach that focuses not only on trade of agricultural goods, but also agri-services,” she suggested.
Barbados’ Minister of Agriculture, Food and Nutrition Security Indar Weir meanwhile expressed concern that the Caribbean had fallen short when it came to the production of value-added products.
“Our region imports a lot of primary agricultural produce, but more than 60 per cent of what is on our food import bill comes in value chain products, processed items, condiments and those types of things. If we are going to truly address the food import bill we have to start to understand what it takes to get back to solid manufacturing so that we can address some of these issues,” said Weir.
Noting that there was a need for a “total revamp” of the agrifood systems in the region, he said the target of reducing the region’s food import bill by at least 25 per cent by 2025 was a good start.
He also urged farmers to move away from a mindset that they are hustling and not necessarily doing a business.
“It is a business. We must move policy to drive people into the reality that training must be at the core of all of this. We must move people to the point that they recognise that they must be able to measure what they produce. They must be able to apply cost, you must be able to track your operating expenditure and equally, we must move people to a space where they understand if we can grow it here, we eat what we grow, we grow what we eat and have healthier lives,” he said.
Meanwhile, Dr Renata Clarke, Sub-Regional Coordinator for the Caribbean Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), said there were several constraints to the region having a competitive edge in producing value-added products.
She identified high costs, regulation and lack of access as some of the hindrances.
“The cost of a healthy diet in the Caribbean is among the highest in the world, if not, the highest. Not only must we be producing locally, but we must be producing efficiently,” she said.
Calling for greater collaboration among regional organisations and all industry stakeholders, Clarke also identified low production levels, lack of access to seeds and planting materials and poor infrastructure as other challenges to be addressed.
“There are many things that are under the tip of the iceberg that have to be put in place to make sure we can be producing and marketing efficiently,” she said. (MM)
