I am from a family of farmers in the Artibonite District, so I take to heart these issues pertaining to the agriculture sector of the economy. Before we go any further, let us be reminded that Haiti is a country essentially agricultural. At least, that is what we learned in grammar school in Haiti. The problems our farmers are dealing with all across the country are two-fold: access to credit and technical assistance to effectively and efficiently cultivate these acres of fertile lands. No one economy can be developed if the people do not have access to credit, if we do not make it easy for investors to borrow money so they could execute their ambitious projects and create jobs. And lack of access to credit is a MAJOR issue the government needs to work on. I think it is imperative for the farmers to organize themselves in serious organizations or cooperatives to manage and cultivate these lands. Thats the first step in solving the issues in this sector. It is not economically sound to have these poor farmers with no money and technical support on these small and scattered lots cultivating them with their archaic and rudimentary means of production. It is a freaking waste. This is the year 2014, not 1814 for Christs sake. We need to create the National Agro Credit Bank to lend money to these accredited organizations of farmers to execute their agro-projects. Having access to credit is one thing, but if they do not have the required technical support to put the money to good use, it is not going to serve any good; it is going to be a waste of time and resources. So what are we investing in the education of these guys in the agronomy school for? I am sure it is not so they could sit at a desk in their air-conditioned offices collecting a paycheck. They need to be where they belong [in the fields] --to work with these farmers in these agro-organizations or cooperatives to provide this sophisticated technical support I talked about earlier. The farmers also need for these politicians in the central government in Port-au-Prince to champion economic policies that would protect their investments from uncontrolled importation. Needless to say, we need to adopt a very conservative approach to importation. It makes no sense to open our market to these invaders of imported goods destroying our national production.
Posted on: Sun, 12 Oct 2014 02:55:55 +0000
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