Eight family members in Anguilla are benefiting from a farming partnership launched on Monday this week by the Department of Social Development in collaboration with the Department of Agriculture. The Crown land in use is a plot, immediately east of the Tourist Board Office building in The Valley, now under vegetable cultivation.
Commissioner of Social Development, Mr Sanford Richardson, said at the launching ceremony that since 2006 staff members at his Department undertook to develop a series of projects for possible implementation. He explained that his Department was intent on taking a more developmental, rather than welfare, approach to assisting persons requesting aid.
“The challenge of the Department is to seek moving our people from a state of dependence to one of inter-dependenceand self-sufficiency – thus the birth of this initiative,” Mr Richardson stated. “It has taken some years to reach this point. In fact, it is actually the third year since persons have been actively participating in the project, but we are officially launching it today.
“The Department’s role is simply this: to help identify the potential persons and encourage and support them to participate in the project; to maintain a good working relationship with the Department of Agriculture, partnering in this initiative; and to monitor the involvement of the participants and the Department of Agriculture in the project. Because of the subsistence nature of the project, the produce will be used for family consumption primarily and any surplus for sale. The initiative is being coordinated, from the Department’s standpoint, by Social Worker, Mr James Carty.”
Director of Agriculture, Mr William Vanterpool, saw the project as a viable one in which more persons would not only contribute to their own basic subsistence, but also offer some of the produce for sale. He saw the project as an ideal initiative for the less fortunate persons to be supported by the Department of Social Development. He admitted that it was a small project, but said that it was necessary to start off at that size in order to teach the participants the basic skills of farming and then move them to a larger plot, notwithstanding the scarcity of land. He was pleased with the interest shown in the project, by the persons involved, and the volume of vegetables (sweet peppers, eggplant and melons) grown and displayed by them.
Minister of Agriculture, Mr Jerome Roberts, said farming was a keyelement of his ministry and that it was important for persons in Anguilla to endeavour to eat what they grow. He commended both departments for their involvement in the partnership. “These small suggestions, in terms of thinking out of the box, are what is important rather than sitting in offices and continue to dish out to persons what we don’t have,” he observed. “The persons [now benefiting] are seeing the importance of working and how this project is helping them. It is not just that they will benefit on their tables from what they are growing, but will also have some useful money from the sale of surplus produce.”
Mr Roberts hoped that the pilot project would stimulate the interest of a number of other persons to become involved in the project, rather than seek regular financial and other support from the Department of Social Development.
The opening prayer and blessing of the project were done by Rev. Dr. S. Wilfred Hodge, Vice President of the Farmers’ Association, who was accompanied by the President, Mr Elvet Hughes, and others.
