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About the Theme
Agriculture, regardless of how one defines it, is
called upon to meet economic, environmental
and social goals. In preparing agriculture to
meet these goals, Caribbean governments
have organised and re-structured theirinstitutional governance systems and
operations to plan and manage the agricultural
development process. In so doing, planning
agriculture evolved into three-five year cycles of
policies, or strategies or work plans developed
and implemented by Ministries of Agriculture
with varying levels of stakeholder engagement.
There have been risks that have set-back
attainment of agricultures development goals,
mostly weather related (hurricanes), marketrelated (trade liberalisation, changing
consumer demands, etc), financial, institutional
and other risks that are known and occur at all
levels of the agriculture industry. Despite these
risks, agriculture is expected to contribute to
meeting the development goals. Target 2015
is five years away! By then, global poverty is
expected to be reduced by 50%! Global hunger
and malnutrition is also expected to be halved!
Other areas of progress include reducing
natural resource degradation and empoweringwomen.
To fast-track progress to 2015, good
agriculture policy is indispensible; there is no
substitute. The only issue is how the policy
process is conducted, from start to finish,
including, adequate budgetary allocations for
programmes, projects, research and disaster
risk management. The latter is absolutely
essential!
A 2004 United Nations Development Program
(UNDP) Report titled Reducing Disaster Risk-A
Challenge for Development acknowledged that
disasters put development at risk, with
disasters resulting from natural hazards
exacting a tremendous cost on development.
The risks to development are greater now than
ever before, and that is especially given the
high level of global integration. This has given
rise to an environment of uncertainty.Uncertainty, as distinct from risk, can be
described as unknown unknowns, events for
which we have no prior knowledge, or inkling;
events we just cannot predict. Amidst these
risks and uncertainty, agriculture must be
positioned to perform, survive and thrive for
the benefit of the regions wealth (economies)
and health (people and environmental
resources).
Hence issues of policy, the status of naturalresources, coping with hazards and their
disasters, extension services and innovation in
agri-business are all important and related
issues for agriculture to meet its 2015
development targets,
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ART AgendaDAY 1 Tuesday 19th October
Schedule Topic
9:00 -
9:15 am
Welcome and
Introduction
9:15 -
10:30 am
Panel 1:
Planning Agricultures Development:Issues, Process, Expectations Panellists:
-Mr. Gregg Rawlins/IICA-Mr. John King/Suriname-Michael Hailu, Director, CTA-Dr. Lindiwe Sabanda/Southern Africa
Despite weakness of policy structures and capacities, gooagriculture policy remains integral to placing agriculture oa firm footing to deal with old, new and emergingdevelopment challenges. However, there appears to be no
common understanding or philosophy of the subject ofsuch policy agriculture.
ART seeks to clarify the scope of agriculture in the 21stcentury, the signals that demand clear and urgent policyresponses at the national level and stakeholderparticipation in the policy process at all levels.
BREAK 10:30 11:00 am
11:00
12:30 pm
Panel 2:
Saving Agricultures Physical Resources
Panellists :
-Prof. Nazeer Ahmad-Mrs. Lystra Fletcher-Paul-
Mr. Erle Noronha-Dr. Susan Singh-Renton
With global focus on climate change, the plight of land,soils, water and agricultures other natural resources isbeing brought in focus. For decades, outdated land usepolicy/non-enforcement of zoning laws have led to seriousland and water degradation, marine pollution anddeforestation.
ART explores the situation with our soils, water andmarine resources against the backdrop of the need tosubstantially increase the regions food and nutritionsecurity.
LUNCH 12:30 2:00 pm
2:00 -3:30pm
Panel 3:
Coping with Hazards Recovering fromDisaster
Panellists
-Keith Amiel/Jamaica-Dhano Sookoo/Trinidad-Alain Thermil/Haiti-Dr. Guido Marcelle/Grenada
Natural hazards are a naturalpart of life on earth.Farming, in particular, given its dependence on naturalresources, is vulnerable to natural hazards and thedisasters that could arise when they occur. High rainfall,hurricanes, pests and diseases, are among the naturalhazards that pose high risks to farming. The largenumbers of small and resource constrained farmers often
do not have coping strategies and the absence of riskmitigation programmes compounds the problems. ARTexamines the issue of natural hazards, disasters andissues critical to fast-tracking agriculturesrecovery afterdisaster,
3:30
4:00 pm
Daily Round Up
END OF DAY 1
ART AgendaDAY 2 Wednesday 20th October
Schedule Topic
9:00 -
10:30 am
Panel 4:
Re-Branding Extension to Service Chains
Panellists:
- Felix Leslie/MoA-Dominica- Joe Pires/Caribbean Chemicals- David Dolly/UWI-Extension- Jos Fonseca/CTA
The frontline has come under much attack over the last15 years at least, in terms of the relevance andeffectiveness of Ministry of Agriculture services tofacilitate change and transformation in agriculture. Therehave been several often unanswered calls for privatesector to take over these services. To meet 2015development targets, extension will continue to be an
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ART Agendaimportant player. Some questions remain: what servicesare now required; who will provide them?
ART re-opens the extension debate in an attempt to getclarity on what are the issues and prospects for movingfrom tradition and re-branding Agriculture Extension.
BREAK 10:30 11:00 am
11:00
12:30 pm
Panel 5:
Innovating the Agri-Business (product,process, etc)
- Fredericka Deare/KAIRI- Steve Maximay/SBI- Marian Hart/BADMC- Allister Glean/TTABA
Agriculture producers, both in the fresh produce andprocessed products segments of the industry, have tocontend with economic imperatives of business - intense
and dynamic competition in agricultural markets, andsocial imperatives of development nutritious and safefoods. It often seems that there is no middle ground inplanning for and/or achieving these objectives. Howeverthey have one thing in common the need to continuouslyinnovate, something which has become more imperative itodays world of climate change,
ARTlooks at the responses to innovation in Caribbeanagriculture and the sustainability of these for business,food security and agricultural development in general.
LUNCH 12:30 2:00 pm
2:00
3:30 pm
Panel 6:
YiA - Preparing for 2015 agriculture A special panel done in collaboration with the Caribbean
Agriculture Forum for Youth3:30
4:00 pm
Closing IICA
CTA
END OF DAY 2
Round Table MannersART isnot a seminar, lecture series,workshop, consultation, or any of the
'official', 'formal', 'pre-set' meeting.
ART is: a platform for open dialogue and sharing
of expertise, information and ideas;
an entry point for media to get moreconnected with agriculture stakeholders;
a mechanism for interested, affected,movers and shakers in agriculture to
make connections, communicate &
network for development