The head of the Barbados Agricultural Society (BAS) has sounded the alarm over the potential negative impacts of excessive and unnecessary imports on the island’s farmers ahead of the ICC T20 Cricket World Cup
As excitement builds for next month’s tournament, the BAS’ Chief Executive Officer James Paul said a flood of food imports risks saturating the market and posing serious challenges for Barbadian farmers.
He criticised what he sees as a surge in import requests being justified by the World Cup.
“From the moment the World Cup was announced, all of a sudden we need to import,” Paul declared.
Highlighting a surge in import requests that he believes could undermine the local agricultural community, the farming leader criticised the use of the World Cup as a justification for these imports.
He expressed concern that import licences are being granted out of fear that Barbados’ reputation would be tarnished if demands are not met during the tournament.
“That won’t happen, but then they take the opportunity to import even more than is actually required, which is a problem for us,” he said, urging authorities against granting unnecessary licences.
“This is where I want the authorities to be vigilant and on guard. Do not go about giving import licences to importers. Some of them are not even connected to the agri-sector, and then that produce remains on the island to pose a problem for local producers.”
Pointing to another potential impact of excessive imports, Paul warned of domestic producers being forced into “unfair” competition with low-priced imports.
“One of the things that is happening is that you find that buyers in the market of agricultural produce are asking farmers to compete with agricultural products that they have been able to obtain at very low prices, which is unfair. It’s extremely unfair,” he said.
Ahead of the World Cup, the BAS boss called for a reassessment of import policies to protect Barbadian agriculture.
“It was never an issue whether or not we would be able to supply the appropriate quantities of food items that will be required. Whether pork, poultry, milk… it was never an issue and even if there was likely to be an issue, the agricultural sector is very responsible in terms of coming forward to the ministry or whoever and saying, ‘look, we have a problem here, and this is how we suggest that we resolve it’,” Paul said, highlighting the ability of Barbadian producers to meet demand.
He urged that the World Cup “should not be used as an opportunity to try to import more than required quantities of agricultural produce” which could harm domestic farmers. “Stop using events like the World Cup, when it does come to our shores, as an opportunity to try to import more than required quantities of agricultural produce,” he said.
