By: Richard Simon

St. George’s, Grenada: “The Caribbean is its own worst enemy,” according to Dr. Cliff Riley, Consultant for the International Trade Centre, Geneva on Food Safety and Product Innovation in the Caribbean, Africa and the Pacific, who recently attended a four-day workshop in Grenada, examining how the coconut industry can advance through commercialization and agro-processing.

Dr. Riley, who has responsibility for helping the region utilize coconuts to create products that facilitate trade among Caribbean countries as well as provide value added products to the US, European and UK markets, said the region has not done well in harnessing and utilizing the resources provided by the international community for the sustainable development of the Caribbean.

In an exclusive interview with Grenada’s leading business publication, The Barnacle, Dr. Riley said the region must embrace a new mindset, moving away from the expectation that the international community owes a debt to the region because of slavery or other considerations.

He argued that the region must begin to see and treat agriculture as a business rather than “a means of livelihood for some segments of the society”, suggesting that if agriculture was given the same attention as tourism, “the entire CARICOM region will be wealthy.”

 “We have to look at how we strengthen and grow our economies so we can be independent of whatever factors exist in the global market space,” he said, noting that the region enjoys additional benefits, including similarity of language and taste profile, a large and loyal diaspora and the ability of countries to interact across and through the mechanisms of CARICOM.

The ITC official says the region must examine the ways trade can be enhanced by moving from the export of raw materials to value added products that allow the Caribbean diaspora to support its taste profile even outside of their home environments. He pointed out that focus must be placed on ensuring that products can be marketed to meet the convenience of people who now reside outside the region.

“We have to recognize the dynamics of the market and understand how the buying preferences have changed” given that the diaspora no longer comprise people who left in the ‘70’s and ‘80’s but their children and grandchildren, some of whom have no first hand relationship with the region outside of a visit every so often.

“It’s all about convenience”, he said, citing the processing of coconut milk which provides the convenience of packaging for people who are interested in using Caribbean foods but do not have the knowledge or the time to follow the traditional preparation methods.

He said the region’s public and private sectors must invest in the technologies, knowledge and machinery to manufacture quality products for local consumption as well as meeting the needs of customers in the global market place.

He challenged Caribbean leaders to scrutinize and analyze the ease associated with the importation of goods and services into the region compared with the degree of difficulty faced by individuals and businesses attempting to export their goods and services.

“The wealth, the revenue generation, the economy of scale from agricultural commodities will come from export, when we treat agriculture as a business. In the Caribbean we don’t have a culture of producing refined products. We have a culture of exporting raw materials in their raw state and accepting the price that we get, and then we import the refined commodity,” Riley said.

He added that the time has come for the recognition that “our soil is a natural resource” and “an asset” which gives our agricultural products their “unique flavor.”

Riley argued that the region must begin to concentrate its efforts on developing quality niche market products that, due to size, cannot be mass produced or produced in large quantities.

“Why do artisan products sell for such a high price, why do organically grown and certified products attract such a high price? Its not because of the volume. Its the quality of the commodity, it’s the taste profile and uniqueness of that particular commodity, He said.

Speaking at the end of the four day exercise at the Trade Center in St. George’s, Riley noted the importance of boosting local production and consumption with a focus on value addition and , strengthening the Caribbean value chain.

More than 20 coconut farmers, agricultural extension officers and manufacturers from across the region attended the meeting which provided holistic training on the sustainable development of the coconut industry.

Grenada, according to the ITC, is one of 12 countries benefiting from the second phase of the EU-funded Alliances for Coconut Industry Development in the Caribbean project at the International Trade Centre (ITC).  The CARIFORUM Secretariat, the Caribbean Agricultural Research and Development Institute CARDI are among a list of regional partners supporting the project.