Dear Editor:
Further to my letter, "An Adumbration of the greatness of our food exporting farmers" (KN, May 11, 2017). I would submit suggestions to expand the livelihood of our non-rice and non-sugar farmers.
• Land devolved into practical useful size plots for family cultivation.
• Funding for loans which will be used as seed capital by the new landed farmer for basic but fundamentally difficult steps toward their development and prosperity. The seed loans are the venue through which the farmer is educated to the new technologies inherent in wind, water and solar engines. A new understanding of how water, wind and effort can be brought to the land for effective agricultural production. Hopefully to allow the farmers to an epiphany which says “farming is a profession of the utmost values, and not a fall back for the poor and defeated in spirit”.
Using, Internet Technology.
• This will naturally develop as an adjunct as the farmer gets more familiar with alternate energy technology to link him to the global community or link the individual farmer and community of farmers to the global similarities of interest.
• Opening of a channel for innovation, innovative thinking and experimentation and research.
Outcome of a Useful Model of Wales as a Transformative Agricultural Model for Similar Communities in Cane Industry History.
• Initial mapping of what a green economy could and should be.
• A defining model that can be used in other traditionally agricultural communities in Guyana especially and worldwide.
• The creation of globalized villages directly interacting with each other.
Optimization of Existing Resources to the Aforementioned Results.
Norway Fund: The biggest problem which appears to be hindering the transition of sugar industry in forms and function is the universal lament of lack of capital (money) seen as necessary for any movement to occur in transition to take form or begin. Notwithstanding the fact that there is the Green Fund the Govt. of Norway has agreed to as part of Guyana’s commitment to the protection of its greenery.
Capital inherent in the Guyana Diaspora – savings and assets that might be mobilized if some form of a monetary financial system were to be implemented in Guyana i.e. an active and well stocked Equities Market, Bond Market, at National, Municipal and Community levels. A foreign saving account banking in Guyana which allows for non-taxable Capital Gains and Stable Savings rates. Well identified and carefully researched projects which would be geared at attracting foreign investments.
We do want cooperation among the future adherents of the Project Wales. This cooperation need not be in form but in substance. Settlers will be in charge of their own cultivation plots, they will cooperate by way of written contracts, and basic regulations in areas of maintenance of drainage and irrigation, dams, joint purchase of inputs to production, joint marketing, central processing, and all matters relevant to assuring sound business practices. As a consequence of the foregoing, cooperation/cooperatives would emerge, being the natural needs/requirements of community life.
Senior and other managerial staff at Wales is essential to the superintendence of the project. The projection of Wales as the forerunner to a larger transition will include the entire West Bank Demerara. The former cane farmers who have been involved in the cooperative spirit, other owners of freehold lands, including the Canal Polders will come under the umbrella of the seasoned managers in the creation of mega fruit production, beginning with Wales.
Some form of training in “other crops” will be quickly absorbed by these skilled persons, who already know the new farmers, the terrain and other faculties of Wales. We should endeavour to keep these professionals in the rural environment for all sorts of reasons, chief of which is the continued brain drain that has been affecting Guyana for decades. These are bare-boned possibilities for the envisioning and implementation of the Transition process at Wales.
Hafiz Rahaman, Rural People Organization |
Dear Editor:
The frenzied eagerness and quick acceptance of a proposal to host the 51st Flag Raising Ceremony at the Stabroek Square (now removed to D’Urban Park) by a senior administrative official of the Georgetown Municipality and the almost immediate demand for one hundred million dollars to prepare the venue, is yet another pellucid display of the venality and ineptitude of the Council’s Administration.
In the first instance, without having a comprehensive estimate prepared, without doing a strategic plan of the development of the area, and without even consulting the stakeholders including the vendors, taxi operators, and businesses in the area, like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat, this official just nonchalantly came up with this round mammoth figure. How funny!
Of course there would not have been any bidding or adherence to national tender procedures, but rather just like the parking meter scam, the works would have been handed to their favourite contractor, who is the ‘Francis or Jack of all trades’ and these hard earned taxpayer dollars would have disappeared into the pockets of a few.
When will the President stop having confidence in these vultures at City Hall? When will decent, honest, visionary, and competent persons be placed to manage our city’s affairs?
Persons who could come up with designs and proposals that would see the transformation of the downtown area, including relieving the traffic congestion, the vending problem, the crime infestation, the bellowing music carts, the three card tricksters and the general chaos of that area?
Thankfully the government smelt the rat and stopped the Council’s officials from putting their hands into taxpayers’ pockets and extracting a cool 100 million, by returning the ceremony to Durban Park.
Indeed, in normal circumstances the idea of using the Stabroek Market area would not be a bad one due to the historic nature of the area, the centrality of the location and the layout of the region which would have allowed the military to march up and down Brickdam before doing their tattoo display.
But thanks to the Georgetown City Council, the area is far from ideal for hosting any such activity. Embarrassingly the Stabroek Tower Clocks which were to be fixed to usher in the Jubilee year are still not working.
All but a few of the bulbs that adorned the Market for last year’s special anniversary have blown and have not been replaced, vagrants have made several parts of this area their homes, there are several derelict or abandoned buildings in the area such as the Old GNCB Headquarters and the building which was formerly a gas station, the Stelling and wharf area aback of the market is in tatters and a threat to life and limb. And yet the Council feels justified in wanting to just make some cosmetic improvements and then host the Country’s birthday bash.
All in all, much is left to be desired of the area and hosting such an event there would only give the Council another opportunity to create more hardship and confusion for the vendors, taxi and mini bus operators, commuters, and shoppers.
The Council needs to permanently fix the area, and stop doing clean up drives for special occasions, which only benefits the contractors who are improperly given the tasks of effecting these clean up exercises.
Anu Bihari via email |