President of Guyana Dr Irfaan Ali says his Government is working diligently to have the regional ferry service, which is a tripartite agreement between Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago, and Barbados, to operate out of Parika.
Parika is a port village located in the Essequibo Islands-West region of Guyana.
Ali stated this during an outreach to the Region Three (Essequibo Islands-West Demerara) community where he announced that a processing facility will be built at Bonasika Creek to support farmers to enhance their production of ginger and other vegetables.
The President of Guyana tied it in with the regional ferry service as he told residents of the agricultural base community: “The good thing about here is that we could export directly to CARICOM from here, you don’t need to transport to Georgetown and all these places. That is why we are pushing so hard to get the regional ferry because the regional ferry will operate out of Parika so that we can have all of the production from these islands integrated into the regional market.”
President Ali said the community, which has accelerated ginger production in recent years, has been able to produce 240,000 tonnes of ginger annually.
The Head of State disclosed that he was particularly pleased with the manner in which the community has been using investments in agriculture to their advantage.
“I know you have produced about 50 tonnes of bananas, more than 200,000 pounds of pumpkin and in cassava and other kinds of provision, you have produced more than 120 tonnes…We want to be able to move to large-scale production here,” the President asserted.
According to the Head of State, this increase in production will give the community the opportunity to tap into the Caribbean food market and support the Caribbean Community’s (CARICOM) objective of reducing 25 per cent of food imports by 2025.