Basseterre, St. Kitts, February 28th, 2012 (SKNIS): McGill University of Canada and the University of the West Indies are partnering to spearhead a multicomponent agricultural project which will provide technical assistance to small farmers and improve the nutritional quality meals in schools. 

A number of stakeholders involved in agriculture will soon benefit from a new Agriculture and Nutrition project currently being undertaken in St. Kitts and Nevis with the assistance of McGill University.

Dr. Leroy Phillip, a Professor of Agriculture and Nutrition at McGill University in Canada said in a recent visit to St. Kitts and Nevis that he was here to spearhead a multicomponent agricultural project which is hoped, will not only provide technical assistance to small farmers, but ultimately improve the nutritional quality of the government run school meals programme.

According to Dr. Phillip, St. Kitts and Nevis is one of four countries that will be involved in this food security project that is funded primarily by the Government of Canada. The five million Canadian dollar project, which will also see operations in St. Lucia, Trinidad & Tobago and Guyana, will be run under the auspices of the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and the International Development and Research Center (IDRC).

It will also see partnership between McGill University and the University of the West Indies’ St. Augustine campus.
Dr. Phillip said the focus of the project will be on school children and small farmers in the Caribbean to reduce the prevalence of Obesity.

“The principle aim of this project is to improve the health and nutritional wellbeing of the Caribbean people” said Dr. Phillip. “We are concentrating this effort largely with school children and with small farmers. The principle goal is to be able to allow small farmers in these regions and these areas to produce high quality and healthful produce so that school children within the school lunch programme can benefit from a diversified diet that is healthful.”
 
In St. Kitts and Nevis, the food production component of this project involves stimulating the capacity of St. Kitts and Nevis to produce better food crops – both fruits and vegetables, and engage in small ruminant production based on forages. Two sites are proposed for the focus of this project at this time – Stapleton in St. Peters and Mansion’s villages.

In St. Peter’s, five small farmers will be given training in planting mulatto grass and using the principleof grazing systems to supplement animal feed.

“This site at Stapleton is one of two sites where we are working” the Professor said. “Here we are going to be working on planting grass, this is a locally adapted grass called mulatto grass, and we are involving five farmers, and we are going to be demonstrating to them the principle of using grazing systems and in addition to grazing using the brush that you see in the vicinity to supplement the animals’ needs particularly during the dry season.”
 
“At the end what we want to be able to do is to increase the performance of the small ruminant sheep and goats so that the time it takes to market these animals, we want to be able to reduce that from about twelve months to about eight months and allow more ruminant meat to be on the market” Dr. Phillip said.
 
In Mansion’s village area, twelve small farmers will be involved in an Irrigation and Crop Productivity component of the project, where the development of a water catchment pond will supply irrigation to small farms immediately below.
“This is a very important vegetable growing area and we are working here with twelve farmers and the idea here is supply these farmers with water” said Dr. Phillip. “Water is going to be crucial for this project for food supply and in this water catchment facility, we’re relying on rain water, and then we’re going to develop and install irrigation lines, and based on gravity feed, the farms which are just below are going to be able to receive water for the crops we are working on to be established and to be productive.”
 
This project has so far received much assistance from the cooperation between the Department of Agriculture and the Water Department and planting is expected to begin in April, 2012.

A large percentage of the produce that will be derived from these small farms under this project will be used in the school meals programme to modify the current menu to improve the nutritional value of the programme where the Ministry of Education will undertake assessment of this project in eight schools.
 

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