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UWI TODAY
– SUNDAY 3 JUNE, 2018
FOOD & AGRICULTURE
Reliable, healthy food sources
are central to
everyone’s wellbeing and survival. Indeed, one of
the first things any young child learns to do in life
is to feed himself. But right now T&T imports most
of its food to the tune of some $6 billion a year. That
includes foreign fruits and vegetables, cereals, dairy,
meat, alcohol, butter, spices, cocoa, fruit juices, flour,
rice, fish and cheese. If such foods from the global food
trade are ever disrupted, or if they become difficult or
simply too expensive or unhealthy for ordinary folk
to access and safely enjoy, we need to rethink those
sources, and find other, perhaps better food options
right here at home. We need to ponder our food
security status.
These and many other relevant issues were raised
at the recent May 10 national symposium on Food
and Nutrition Security held at the University Inn and
Conference Centre, St Augustine, and spearheaded
by The UWI’s own Faculty of Food and Agriculture
(FFA). The one-day symposium brought together
diverse major stakeholders in food, agriculture and
governance from T&T and the region to discuss and
brainstorm some ways forward. Representatives from
farmers’ groups, supermarkets, local and regional
Learning to Feed Ourselves
Food and Nutrition Symposium aims to clarify
national priorities for food security
B Y S H E R E E N A N N A L I
food organizations, NGOs and local government all
participated in the UWI-led initiative.
“Trinidad is not a food secure nation. We have not
been for a long time,” says Dr Wayne Ganpat, Dean
of UWI’s Faculty of Food and Agriculture (FFA), in a
recent interview. “But we once used to be, when our
parents and grandparents grew indigenous foods and
knew how to live off the land.”
“Have you ever heard stories of theWar Gardens?”
he asks, raising his eyebrows. “During World War II
in the 1940s, you couldn’t get anything, no ships were
coming into the Gulf, there was no foreign exchange
to buy anything because all money went into the war
machine. So howwere you going to get food?The then
administration gave some people (rural and urban) a
piece of land to plant food. These were called the ‘War
Gardens’. Everybody grew some food, growing and
eating basic but more nutritious home-grown food
in the absence of luxury imports. And we all survived
and did well.”
He encourages us to think of parallels today:
lack of foreign exchange to import food in a time
of economic challenges, and the possibility of food
scarcity if our imported food trade were ever to be
disrupted. He also reminds us that the destructive
impacts of climate change are already wreaking havoc
on regional agriculture – violent hurricanes, prolonged
droughts, the threat of pest and disease invasions
decimating crops, and short, more intense rainfall and
subsequent flooding doing damage, for instance.
“We have to start taking action,” warns Ganpat.
The Food Security Symposium organizers note
that serious challenges in T&T’s agricultural and food
sectors include:
• poor food safety standards
• lack of institutional coordination across sectors
• insufficient human and capital investment
• low levels of competitiveness and innovation, and
• improper agricultural practices.
All these factors are things that we could fix. Taken
together, they result in an overall alarmingly low level
of food and nutrition security in T&T, say the experts.
So there is much work to be done.
Dr Ganpat would like to see clear national
agricultural policies and strategies for the short, medium
and long terms – such as a five-year plan, a ten-year plan
and a 20-year plan.
“We can’t just focus on the short term. We have to
plan for our children. So for instance at UWI Faculty
of Food and Agriculture, we need to know what crops
Professor Clegg visits Trinidad
Eminent scientist ProfessorMichael Clegg
visited Trinidad to give
a public lecture on May 9 titled “Successes in Food and Nutrition
Security in Latin America and the Caribbean” and to present the
feature address at the opening ceremony of the Food and Nutrition
Security Symposium at the Faculty of Food and Agriculture, UWI
on May 10.
Prof Clegg’s scientific work is focused on population genetics,
molecular evolution and agricultural genetics. His early work
addressed the evolutionary dynamics of linked systems of genes. In
the 1980s and 90s, he helped pioneer the use of molecular sequence
data for understanding plant evolution. In recent years, Clegg has
used genetic methods to explore the history of plant domestication,
an important area of agricultural science.
His visit was facilitated by the Caribbean Academy of Sciences.
From left, Professor Brain Copeland (Pro Vice-Chancellor and Campus
Principal) has a word with Professor Emeritus Michael Clegg (guest speaker,
University of California)
Challenges and Opportunities
for
Food and Nutrition Security in
the Americas – The View of the
Academies of Scienceswas one of two
recently published regional books on
display at the Food and Nutrition
Symposium. It is an Interamerican
Network of Academies of Sciences
( IANAS) and IAP ( the Inter
Academy Partnership) regional
report published in November 2017.
It discusses the state of Food and
Nutrition Security in SouthAmerica,
Canada, Dominican Republic, Cuba,
the USA and has a chapter on the
Caribbean. The Caribbean chapter
notes that “The status of Food
and Nutrition Security (FNS) in
the Caribbean, however, has been
challenged by natural disasters,
overexploitation of natural resources,
volatility in food production and
prices, barriers to trade, outdated
technologies, high incidence of pests
and diseases, climate change, and
lack of an enabling environment to
foster innovation….Foodpolicies are
weak and driven by socioeconomic
and political forces.”
Challenges and Opportunities
for Food and Nutrition Security
in the Americas
The View of the Academies of Sciences
