Lucky Hill Pen farmers to benefit from upgraded water network
Published:Tuesday | March 15, 2022 | 12:08 AMAsha Wilks/Gleaner Writer
FARMERS IN Hinds Town, St Ann, and Lucky Hill Pen, along the parish’s border with St Mary, will soon benefit from an upgrade to their water network with the construction of irrigation facilities, said Agriculture Minister Pearnel Charles Jr.
This was revealed in a Gleaner interview with the minister after an Irish potato farm tour held in February.
The ministry is currently working with the National Irrigation Commission Limited (NIC), which is the primary provider of irrigation services in Jamaica and is responsible for managing, operating, maintaining, and expanding all existing and future irrigation schemes and systems, to procure a two-million-gallon pond in Hinds Town and a 1.5-million-gallon pond in Lucky Hill Pen.
This will allow farmers in desperate need of water to have year-round access to irrigation ponds, making farming easier and more profitable.
“It’s not going to satisfy all that is required but that is why RADA continues to help in terms of the best practices and that’s why we continue to give support in terms of farmers who may not be close to water, but need some support in terms of getting access to water,” said Charles Jr.
Christeen Forbes, public relations specialist at the NIC, told The Gleaner on Wednesday that the two projects are in the feasibility studies and design stages and is slated to commence in the 2022/2023 financial year, beginning April 1.
“The reality is without water, there can be no food production. Therefore, these projects are of significant importance and will be highly beneficial to farmers in Lucky Hill Pen and Hinds Town, as both areas are already highly productive,” she said, noting that the more consistent supply of water will contribute to the expansion of farmers’ businesses.
“With food security a top priority for the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, it is paramount for us to have as much land as possible under irrigated agriculture,” she added.
Charles explained that the ministry should be able to address the concerns of farmer Lawrence Patterson and others across St Ann and St Mary.
Patterson, the farmer in Hinds Town, St Ann, whom the minister mentioned, owns a total of 100 acres spanning across both parishes.
Approximately 50 acres of his land is dedicated to Irish potato cultivation. He also plants a variety of peppers.
Patterson told The Gleaner that he is looking forward to the irrigation water because his farm has been fully dependent on rainfall for a number of years.
He is especially eager because the commitment to build irrigation ponds was made a year and a half ago, but nothing had been done since then.
WORRIED ABOUT QUALITY
Suffering at an exponential rate, Patterson is worried that when reaping season begins sometime in March, his produce may not be up to standard given that it hasn’t rained in over six weeks.
“We need the water right now for them to develop better,” he said.
“The weather pattern change, it’s not like how it used to be so we have to get help,” he said, noting that the usual rainy months are from October to December, but November 2021 was a dry-spell month.
In 2020, November was much more gracious to them, he said.
It is for this reason that he has remained hesitant in planting onions because they require constant watering for them to germinate and cannot survive in dry environments.
Farmers now opt for winter crops while leaving the ground bare until the cooler months arrive, which start in December through to March, because the sun is more destructive to the field in March with no water to satisfy seedlings’ thirst.
Tamara Hyatt, who has been farming for over 16 years in New Pen, St Mary, primarily produces sweet potato, Irish potato, peppers, pumpkin, carrots and sweet pepper. She produces up to 27,000 pounds of potato every four months.
With the minister’s promise, Hyatt hopes to be able to plant Irish potatoes throughout the summer by maintaining them with the irrigation water to be provided.
“We need water here ... we as farmers we are very glad. We can’t wait to get irrigation in this area so we will have more to produce,” she said.
According to Hyatt, even when the area receives a torrent of rainfall for days at a time, the farmers are unable to store the water and, therefore, are unable to mitigate drought conditions.
With 17 to 23 workers currently, she is also in search of more manpower to assist in reaping the produce and carry out other farming activities.
“We need more land,” was her cry to the minister to assist in that regard. She is in need of an additional 30 acres to meet her demand for all the produce she harvests.
Charles Jr informed The Gleaner that he is hoping to help in granting Hyatt’s dream of expanding.
“And when she does, when she reaches that capacity locally, we will be able to look at the export market. Maybe not in terms of Irish potato coming out of the ground but in terms of the diversified products,” the minister said.
He also praised the agricultural sector’s efforts and contributions, expressing his optimism that “we will continue to be blessed so that we can get good, high yields,” he said.