Govt launches cross-sectoral initiative to promote healthier diets

In a special undertaking to enhance nutrition intake within households the Guyana Government through the Agriculture and Health Ministries will soon collaborate on several cross-sectoral ventures to encourage Guyanese to have healthier diets.
The commitment was made by Agriculture Minister Zulfikar Mustapha during a recent courtesy call from outgoing United Nations (UN) Resident Coordinator in Guyana, Yeşim Oruç and Resident Ambassador of the Republic of Chile to Guyana Bernardo José del Pico Rubio.
During their engagement, the UN Resident Coordinator identified several mutual areas of interest Guyana can explore to further enhance its chances of achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which aims to end all forms of hunger and malnutrition by 2030.
In providing her recommendations, Oruç called on the Government of Guyana to strengthen collaboration in the area of food and nutrition by strategically implementing programmes that will better educate the public, particularly youths about the physical and psychological benefits of consuming nutritious food.

“There is some cross-sectoral work, and it’s in your government’s voluntary national review on the Sustainable Development Goals that we have the biggest difficulty in capturing things in SPG targets where multiple agencies, multiple parts of government need to contribute… I think on the nutrition thing, at the FAO conference, the presentations made not just for Guyana but for the region at large, as we’re seeing new world problems in nutrition. From child obesity to other things like cardiovascular diseases and I would love to see a movement, a coalition on nutrition,” the UN Resident Coordinator said.
In response, Minister Zulfikar Mustapha disclosed that government is actively working to better streamline inter-sectorial collaboration to address blind spots.
He stated “we see now, not only from the Ministry of Agriculture’s perspective, but together with the Government of Guyana and other agencies, we have to advance critical areas that we were lacking, and I think that this is a stepping stone to go to greater heights”.
Meanwhile, during his engagement with Resident Ambassador of the Republic of Chile to Guyana Bernardo José del Pico Rubio, Minister Mustapha sought Chile’s support in helping Guyana cultivate new crops.

“We started the production now on the cultivation of corn and soy so, we want to be self-sufficient by next year because we are importing a lot of those. So, if we can get a bit of capacity, Chile can help us in those fields… We also started new high-value crops, things like broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, and so on, it would be great if we can help get expertise in Chile to help us in those areas,” he said.
Further, Minister Mustapha told the Chilean Ambassador that Guyana is aiming to produce food to meet not only its own needs, but be able to supply the Caribbean region and beyond. He said an entire region is counting on Guyana to help in the realisation of a 25 per cent reduction in the food import bill of Caricom by the end of 2025.
In response, the Chilean diplomat disclosed that his government would be happy to expand trade relations with Guyana.
“Actually, we have interest in trying to make a deal on free trade. I mean, it’s still in the very early stages of development, but I know that you have some jurisdiction because your main objective is basically Caricom. But in the future, we are interested,” the Chilean diplomat said. (G1)