Small farmers’ plea leads to on-the-spot loan support decision

In order to boost the country’s production to combat the looming global food crisis, the Guyana Government has lobbied the Demerara Bank to extend its Farmers’ Credit Line to small farmers in Region Seven (Cuyuni-Mazaruni).

This was announced by President Dr Irfaan Ali on Wednesday during an outreach exercise in Bartica.
After hearing pleas of farmers and village leaders from the region for assistance to venture into or expand their agricultural programmes, the Head of State contacted the financial institution on the spot and was able to secure a commitment from the bank to provide financing to Cuyuni-Mazaruni farmers.
“The people from Demerara Bank, they said to me they’re willing to bring the small agricultural loan – which I think is $1.5 million – to this region, to your communities. So, I’m going to have a special programme for farmers,” the President stated.

As such, he further urged farmers in the region to mobilise and apply for this loan so that they too can participate in the agricultural drive and food security initiative. Moreover, the President also encouraged Indigenous Village Councils to come up with projects not only to get financing from the bank but also support from Government.
“If you have 20 small farmers getting 20 different small loans, we add it up together and we can have a medium size project that can supply all the poultry needs, all the food needs for your kitchen in the school feeding programme, which can go back to service the loan. So let’s work on that project together,” he posited.
The Head of State has directed Minister Gail Teixeira, who is the Region Seven parliamentary representative, to work along with a team led by Agriculture Minister Zulfikar Mustapha that will visit the region this weekend to move this initiative forward.
While urging farmers to mobilise, President Ali also encouraged single mothers and single fathers to also take advantage of the opportunity so that they too could be actively involved in the food production system and also earn income for their families.
Last month, Demerara Bank launched the Farmers’ Credit Line that provides much-needed financing to farmers, mostly those along the coast. The loan ranges from $1 million to $1.5 million with a low interest rate and does not require any collateral from applicants.
Meanwhile, other agriculture-related issues raised during Wednesday’s outreach exercise include requests to fix roads and transportation for produce as well as the provision of farming supplies.
President Ali informed the residents that Minister Mustapha and his team would conduct a complete assessment of the type of assistance needed and would come up with plans to address their needs.

Food security drive
The Toshao of Batavia, Orin Williams, asked for help in expanding traditional farming as well as technology training.
“Our people, we know about traditional farming – planting cassava, potatoes and other ground provisions, but we know we can do more. But we need your help. We need the help of the Government to assist us there… We also need technical training for agriculture and aquaculture in my village,” the Toshao pleaded.
The Head of State committed to lend technical support, and indicated that the Agriculture Ministry would have to carry out an assessment of all the villages to see how much cassava and sweet potatoes they produce in order to mobilise investment from the region to supply foreign markets.
“We could talk to the Private Sector in Bartica to see whether we could get them interested – if the Government build the shell – in a facility that would process the cassava into cassava flour and the sweet potato because when we were in Barbados recently, there’s a huge market for the cassava flour and the sweet potato there. We’re working now on a new food terminal in Barbados so we have to work on increasing the production,” he noted.
Additionally, Toshao Shane Cornelius from the Indigenous village of Karrau also requested a shade house from the Government. He said the Village Council would be providing the material and the shade house would help support the school kitchen programme.
“We are trying to move away from the traditional logging and mining, and get into agriculture and tourism,” Cornelius stressed.
President Ali committed to supporting the shade house initiative in the community, noting that Government has a massive food security drive and will support the Cuyuni-Mazaruni region to play its role in this initiative.
In fact, he made a similar promise to a female farmer, who represented the group of farmers from One to Five Miles, Bartica. Elroy David related, “I could tell you about the greenhouse because I tried one with the construction plastic, but it’s weak. So, we’re asking if you can grant us some greenhouses – just the covering, we will find the frames.”
She also asked for better breeds of pigs for the 12 to 15 livestock farmers in the area.
“One of the things we want to do in this region is enhance the breeding stock and of course, we have a programme for the breeding stock of pigs… and the shade house material, we will definitely work on supporting you with this,” the President assured.
During his remarks to the scores of persons gathered at the outreach on Wednesday, the Guyanese Leader pointed to the looming global food crisis and Guyana’s role in combating this especially within the Caribbean Community (Caricom). He noted that Region Seven needed to do more to increase its food production, thus increasing its revenue.
“Imagine we have a school feeding programme in all our schools. Imagine if every school now, we can have single parents who have children in those schools doing one or two shade houses in every school and supplying the school kitchen with the produce from those shade houses. That is how you build economic opportunity. That is what you call the trickle-down effect of investment from the Government,” he contended.
Meanwhile, in addition to making requests, the village leaders also highlighted the programmes and projects implemented under the Ali-led People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Administration that enhanced agricultural activities in their communities including the provision of machinery such as tractors and the $10 million COVID funds.
President Ali also disclosed that the $25,000 household grant for Indigenous and riverine communities in the hinterland that was announced last month would be rolled out shortly.