Ministry of Agriculture provides over one hundred thousand vegetable seedlings to farmers
The Ministry of Agriculture, through its Central Farm facility, has embarked on a journey to provide over one hundred thousand vegetable seedlings to farmers affected by incessant rains which resulted in nationwide floods in 2020. In late December, OIRSA donated high-quality seeds to Belize for distribution to farmers. Concerned that the farmers may sit on the seeds and leave them to waste, the Central Farm Research Development and Innovation Centre took up the challenge to create a system to produce seedlings from the seeds for distribution. News Five’s Paul Lopez has more.
Gary Ramirez, National Program Coordinator for Vegetable and Root Crop Production
Gary Ramirez
“Traditionally in producing seedlings, there is a product called germinating mix that is imported and cost just about a hundred dollars to procure. Obviously, that has additional cost.”
Paul Lopez, Reporting
To reduce cost, Central Farm developed its own soil mix using locally availability materials.
Salazar
Salazar, Nursery Manager
“Using regular soil which is sieved, soil and sand and humus. The soil is sieved, the sand as well. And Humus as you may know is castings from the worm that we grow here, the California worm. In this case we are using two parts of soil, one part of sand and half part of humus. We mix this together and that is how we are replacing a commercial product which we call the germinating mix.”
This process has saved the Ministry 60,000 dollars. Humus is the key component of this mix, and here at Central Farm there is an organic section filled with these California worms that digest cow manure to create the humus. The mix is then placed in trays. Tiny holes are created in each section of the tray. A single seed is then placed in each hole. Those trays are then placed in a green house, where they sit until they reach a stage fit for distribution to farmers.
Jose Abelardo Mai, Minister of Agriculture, Food Security and Enterprise
Jose Abelardo Mai
“What we are having today is that we are distributing these seeds country wide to farmers and to people who are doing backyard gardens. We are not fully prepared in each district. Each district is supposed to have structure like this, but they don’t .SO that is the next step. We are having each district having a structure like this so that they can have their own seedling to distribute to their own people in the rural and urban areas.”
Paul Lopez
“How many farmers were affected, and how many will benefit from this project?”
Jose Abelardo Mai
“I do not remember the exact number. But from this project we will have people across the country. We still have in warehouse, about eighty, more than a hundred thousand seeds. They will put that in nurseries across the country.”
The seedlings are transported across the country using a transportation box, also developed by the technical people at the Central farm facility. Minister of Agriculture, Abelardo Mai told News 5 that the Ministry also plans to begin distribution to schools, hopefully in May.
Reporting for News 5 I am Paul Lopez.
