Rwanda to Host ICT Conference On Agriculture

From November 4 to 8, Rwanda will host an Information and Communication Technology (ICT) for Agriculture international conference.
This conference will allow participants to explore solutions that will promote the application of ICTs in the Agriculture sector while focusing on areas, such as value chain, advocacy and policy development.

In addition, the conference is intended to address the following:

• Issues in agriculture that can be addressed using ICTs, 
• How ICTs are truly empowering producers and consumers along entire value chain, 
• Developments taking place in this area, 
• ICT trends and their impact on agriculture and rural development capacity building, enabling environments and sustainability.

To read more, please click the link provided Rwanda to Host ICT Conference On Agriculture

Food and Agriculture agency head shows support for Caribbean

Dr. Jose Graziano da Silva, FAO Director General, attended the Opening Ceremony of a packed conference held on the 40th anniversary of CARICOM’s founding. He met with President of Guyana and Lead Head of Government for Agriculture, Dr. Ronald Ramoutar, Prime Ministers of the Bahamas, Grenada and St. Kitts, Mr. Perry Christie, Dr. Keith Mitchell and Dr. Denzil Douglas, respectively, as well as the Foreign Ministers of Dominica and Suriname.

Dr. Graziano, who has headed FAO since January 2012, took the opportunity to personally outline a series of changes and reforms which are making the Organization more efficient and responsive to Member Countries’ needs. He also spoke about FAO’s new strategic objectives and its focus, not just on the reduction, but the eradication of hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition. He reiterated that hunger levels are impacted by climate change, disaster resilience, governance, inclusion and access and offered the Organization’s help in dealing with those challenges...

To read the full article: Food and Agriculture agency head shows support for Caribbean

Jamaican Pig Farmers to Benefit from CPJ-led Export Thrust

Caribbean Producers Jamaica Ltd, (CPJ) has identified several markets for the commercial export of Jamaican pork.

Pig farmers will benefit from the export, as CPJ will target markets in St Maarten, St Lucia, Antigua & Barbuda, the Bahamas, the Cayman Islands, the Turks and Caicos Islands, Aruba, and Curacao.

To drive the exports, CPJ has joined Sweet River Abattoir, one of the leading slaughterhouses in Jamaica that handles pigs supplied by almost 400 farmers from across the island.

Sweet River is building a new US$3-million abattoir in Westmoreland and farmers have also invested approximately US$3-million in growing operations in order to take advantage of the export opportunities. These investments will feed directly into CPJ's US$5-million, state-of-the-art meat processing plant at its Montego Bay headquarters....

To read more Jamaican Pig Farmers to Benefit from CPJ-led Export Thrust

Adapted from The Pig Site.

Ministry of Agriculture set to review Root and Tuber policy

Roots and tuber crops such as potatoes and sweet potatoes are now the second most important food crop in Kenya after maize.

Kenya’s total production of potatoes in 2011 was 2.6 million tonnes valued at 327 million U.S. dollars from 135,924 hectares of land.The production of sweet potatoes also increased from an area of 61,902 ha with a production of 759,471 tonnes valued at 242 million dollars in 2011 to an area of 66,971 ha with a production of 859,549 tonnes valued at 310 million dollars in 2012.

The government has also provided funding for agricultural training centres to carry out seed potato multiplication to the tune of 350,000 dollars.

Adapted from Coastweek. 

To read more: Ministry of Agriculture set to review Root and Tuber policy

International Conference on Roots and Tubers

The Central Tuber Crops Research Institute in Indian held a four-day international conference, which began on July 9. The event was organised with the assistance of the Indian Society for Root Crops (ISRC). The main theme of the conference was "Tropical Roots and Tubers for Sustainable Livelihood under Changing Agro-cimate". 

The objective of the conference was to discuss the role of tropical tuber crops for food and livelihood security of millions of people of tropical world under changing agro-climate. 

Agriculture representatives  from India, USA, Colombia, Pery, China, Switzerland, Germany, Nigeria, and Thailand, just to name a few, were in attendance

To read more: International Conference on Roots and Tubers

Women on the Land: Creating Conscious Community

Documentary presents women’s role in agriculture; Local women contribute with music, paintings:

Many women have played key roles in agriculture through the years, working by themselves or with family members to produce enough food to feed themselves, with maybe enough left over to bring to market and make some money. 

A documentary film titled Women on the Land: Creating Conscious Community, will be featured in two upcoming performances at TSJC. The film will be shown on Saturday, Sept. 8, from 6-8 p.m. and Sunday, Sept. 9, from 2-4 p.m. at the Massari Theater on the TSJC campus. Admission is $5, with children 12 and under getting in free.

Local artist Jaquie Gipson, who did the soundtrack for the film, will perform live during the screening. Original paintings by artist Karen Howl, based on scenes from the film, will be available for viewing. Amanda Gray, who is featured in the film, will speak about her experiences as a skilled farmer and goatherd.

Adapted from The Trinidad Times. To read more on  Women’s role in agriculture

Identify Emerging Issues for Youths in Agriculture in Trinidad and Tobago.

The Office of the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) in Trinidad and Tobago in partnership with the Agribusiness Society of the University of the West Indies (ABS) hosted an Agri-Youth Symposium entitled, "To Identify Emerging Issues for Youths in Agriculture in Trinidad and Tobago".

The Agribusiness Society (ABS) is a student organization, whose members consist of undergraduate and postgraduate students of the Faculty of Food and Agriculture within the University of the West Indies (UWI), St. Augustine campus, Trinidad. It's mandate is "to create conditions conducive to the development of agri-preneurs by empowering students through practical and theoretical learning, professional growth, networking service, innovation and entrepreneurship".

ABS focus is to "sensitize fellow students and the public to the scale of opportunities available for developing agriculture as a career choice through agribusiness and other related fields".


To read more: Identify Emerging Issues for Youths in Agriculture in Trinidad and Tobago.