Reviving the Caribbean coconut industry

During the Caribbean Week of Agriculture 2013, held in Georgetown, Guyana, CTA co-organised a series of events addressing topics from development of the coconut industry to entrepreneurship among women, events attended by participants from both the Caribbean and Pacific countries.

Funded under the Intra-ACP Agricultural Policy Programme, the study on reviving the Caribbean coconut industry exposed valuable knowledge to be employed in future strategic planning. 

The following extract was included in the 2013 CTA Annual Report:

<<It’s hard to think of a more versatile tropicalcrop. Coconuts are used in arange of food, beverage, health, cosmetic,jewellery and furniture products,and they provide a living for thousands ofsmallholder farmers. Demand is booming,especially in the United States, where themarket for coconut water alone is now worthUS$500 million a year.

However, Caribbean countries have notbeen taking full advantage of increasinglocal demand and expanding regional andinternational markets. Although coconutfarming is an important economic activity–there are over 8000 growers in Jamaica – production has been falling in manycountries. For example, in the DominicanRepublic, annual production slumpedfrom 250 million nuts in the 1970s to an estimated80 million nuts in 2013.In October 2013, CTA and the CaribbeanAgricultural Research and DevelopmentInstitute (CARDI) organised a two-daytechnical workshop on the coconut industryduring the 12th Caribbean Week of Agriculturein Georgetown, Guyana. This was held in consultation with the CARIFORUMambassadors based in Brussels.“We brought together 80 producers, processorsand experts from the Caribbean,the Pacific and EU to discuss the 2013needs assessment study report fundedby the European Commission, and gainbuy-in on future strategies for reviving theindustry,” says CTA’s Judith Ann Francis.

Speakers identified a number of challenges.These included: ageing coconut palms– typically over 50 years and semi-abandonedgroves; pests and diseases, someof which are lethal and difficult to manage;a limited gene pool of disease-resistant andhigh-yielding varieties; poor husbandry practicesand limited research and development.

Workshop participants agreed on a roadmapto revive the Caribbean industry. “It’sa multipronged approach that requiresfour interventions that need to go hand-in-hand,”says Judith. This involves improvingthe availability of high-quality plantingmaterial, enhancing scientific capacity,developing new value-added niche products,gathering better market intelligence,and mobilising private and public sectorfinance.“We cannot use old infrastructure to developan important new industry,” Guyana’sAgriculture Minister, Dr Leslie Ramsammy,told participants.“We need policy, science, farm and marketlinkages.”The outcomes were presented to the Forumof Ministers of Agriculture and seniorofficials during the Alliance and the Councilfor Trade and Economic Development(COTED) meetings. “The revival of the Caribbeancoconut industry is now firmly onthe policy-making agenda,” says Judith.>>

Source: CTA Annual Report http://bit.ly/1kSIJo4