Toshao of Santa Rosa, Stavros Stanley said the Council’s plans to resuscitate its ground coffee project in Moruca, Sub-Region One, is well underway.
The Santa Rosa ground coffee project was reintroduced to the region in 2018. This $10 million investment was aimed to not only boost the region’s economy, but the country.
Fifteen farmers were identified to benefit from the project and each was allocated 800 Robusa coffee beans for cultivation. It was also being supervised by Jamaican Agricultural Scientist, Dr Leroy Santiago.
Stanley told DPI that this decision was taken as he believes the country’s agriculture sector will become the backbone of its economy hence more emphasis is being placed on the region’s agricultural prospects.
“We have over 4000 coffee plants still living there and so I went out there about a week ago and I brought fertilisers, chemicals and so on so that we can supplement those plants and have them revive,” he told DPI.
To complement this effort, the village has also begun a cash crop farm to ensure the farmers are financially sustained while awaiting coffee production. A portion of the monies earmarked for the coffee project was used, according to the Toshao.
He explained that the village, “cannot plant eschalots here and get it to the market before it spoil but we can do things that have long shelf life like ginger, turmeric, red beans, peanuts and so on. That is why we are focusing on that because it is our hope that we would be able to have a food processing plant here where we can process all or most of our products to bring value added to it.”
To ensure the success of this project, the farmers were equipped with the technical knowledge on planting techniques and pest control methods to boost their yield.
