Govt investing heavily in innovative agricultural solutions – Mustapha

…tells FAO of new rice varieties improving yield, quality

Guyana, which was represented by Agriculture Minister Zulfikar Mustapha at the Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO’s) Regional Conference for Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), is well on its way to developing innovative ways to increase food production.

Minister Mustapha made these remarks on Day 3 of the 37th session of the FAO Regional Conference for the LAC in Quito, Ecuador, the opening session of which he chaired. During his presentation, the Minister highlighted the need for countries to be innovative in their approach to agriculture.
“Our country, the Government of Guyana, has been encouraging and investing in innovations with a focus on productivity, improvements, driven by the research and development strengthening, climate resilience, advancing the use of technology, and intensifying improved land and water managing practices,” he said.
“Productivity improvements are driven by research in the following areas: High-yielding rice varieties. A new, high yielding rice variety, GRDB-16, with the potential of 9 tonnes per hectare, was released. This variety has benefits such as higher yield, only 110 days to maturity, and it can germinate in water up to nine inches,” he said.
Mustapha explained that with this variety in play, the national average for rice cultivation has moved from 39 bags per acre to approximately 60 bags per acre.
Mustapha also spoke of bio-fortified rice, which he said has also improved the quality of rice and its nutritional content.
On the 2nd day of the conference, Minister Mustapha made an impassioned plea to the FAO for more financing for research, and for the increased involvement of the organization in food security matters. According to him, there should be a financial mechanism that makes resources readily and equally available for smart, small, adaptive, and unformed research.
“We would like to see a financial mechanism that makes resources readily available and equally available for small, adaptive, and unformed research targeting small farming communities and indigenous people. And today, when the world has been faced with serious problems of climate change, we’ve seen the devastation in some countries,” Minister Mustapha said.
“The entire economy was wiped out because of climate change. I think we’ve come to a point where we have to make a decision on what is necessary for us to move forward,” Mustapha further explained.
These remarks came in support of comments made by St Vincent & the Grenadines’ Minister of Agriculture, Forestry, Fisheries, Rural Transformation, Industry & Labour, Saboto Caesar, who also maintained that more time, money, and efforts must be allocated towards developing a climate change strategy for the small island developing states (SIDS) in the region, particularly on the importance of the blue and green economies.
Minister Caesar noted, too, that some of the fundamental principles and precepts of the Samoa Pathway should be reintegrated, and he called on the FAO to promote more nature-based solutions when addressing the issue of food and agriculture.
Minister Caesar further stated that climate change continues to be a serious problem for SIDS in the Caribbean, and called on the FAO to take a stand on the issue.
“Today, climate change is causing serious problems within our countries in the small island developing states, especially in the Caribbean. We are so vulnerable to climate change that when we are now improving our agriculture capacity, it seems that we are taking risks, because of climate change,” he said.
“And we cannot allow one and two countries to dictate the pace or the way forward for us. We are living in these times, we are living in these vulnerable places, we know what we are experiencing, and we are now appealing that the FAO must take strong measures to take a stand on these issues. Because our future depends on it,” Minister Caesar had said. (G3)