The Tribune

By NATARIO McKENZIE Tribune Business Reporter nmckenzie@tribunemedia.net THERE needs to be a "shift in the perception" that the Bahamas cannot sustain itself, one produce executive telling Tribune Business: "We need to be able to feed ourselves at a basic level." Joy Sweeting, operations manager at Lucayan Tropical, told this newspaper: "There needs to be an industry policy for farming to respond to the needs of farmers." Speaking with Tribune Business at the fifth Agri-Business Expo, Mrs Sweeting said there also needed to be greater co-operation between Bahamian farmers in the industry. "Farmers need to work co-operatively so that they can make more gains. The quality needs to be there, the availability to ship needs to be there, and there needs to be a lot more co-ordination so that everybody is not growing the same product, flooding the market and not getting good returns for their product," Mrs Sweeting said. "Farming is a tough business, and farmers need to get good value for their crops. There are things that we can be doing to help the industry, but farmers needs to take advantage of them." Mrs Sweeting said greater focus needed to be placed on the crops that can be grown in the Bahamas. She added: "We need to be focusing on the crops we can grow. We have all the means here; there is simply not the will. Why are we importing bananas in this country? Why are we not paying ourselves to grow bananas? Anyone can grow bananas, all you need is a hole." "There needs to be a deep shift in our perception that we are not able to feed ourselves. We need to be able to feed ourselves at a basic level. The oil prices are coming and we are not making provisions for our people." There are about 117 booths at this year's expo, with 43 fruit and vegetable booths, according to Telford Mullings, co-ordinator of the event.