Agriculture Minister of St. Kitts and Nevis, the Hon. Samal Duggins, is pushing for greater South-South cooperation to advance agriculture.
“Agriculture today, demands regional solidarity and global partnerships, especially south-south cooperation. This is why St. Kitts and Nevis has been deepening our ties with our brothers and sisters in Africa. More recently, we have been establishing strong ties with Nigeria. Our partnership, though, is more than bilateral; it is a demonstration of what South-South collaboration means when you put it into practice. It reflects the understanding that our challenges are shared, and so too, must be our solutions,” the Minister said on 29 September as the 19th Caribbean Week of Agriculture opened in St. Kitts and Nevis.
The CWA has attracted other Ministers of Agriculture, Heads and representatives of regional and international organisations and partners, a delegation from Nigeria, and stakeholders in the agriculture sector.
“Together we can exchange knowledge on climate-smart farming. Together we can mobilise investment across various areas of agro-processing; together we can build new value chains that stretch across the Atlantic. Together, we can forge a bridge between Africa and the Caribbean widening opportunities for trade, technology transfer and widening opportunities for cultural exchanges. This is the spirit of south-south cooperation,” the Minister said in his address.
He added that this kind of cooperation is not optional for the Caribbean, but essential to thrive in a world of shifting geopolitics, fragile supply chains, and growing climate threats.
His comments echoed sentiments of representatives of the Nigeria government, who also spoke at the opening ceremony.
Dr. Olufemi Ayokunle Ogunseinde, Executive Director of the Ministry of Finance Incorporated (MOFI) of Nigeria said the “time for south-south cooperation is now” and called for planting seeds of a long-term partnership.
“We see several areas where Nigeria, the Caribbean and Latin America can cooperate: one in financing where we can pull our resources together, working with MOFI and other relevant institutions, the Caribbean Development Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank and others to unlock and others to unlock blended finance for agriculture. We also want to look at joint projects where we can establish pilot farms and agro-processing hubs in both regions creating supply chains that reduce losses and boost mutual exports,” he said.
He recommended a platform for South-South collaboration and a compact between the Caribbean and Nigeria.
In a video message played at the opening ceremony, Senator Abubakar Kyari, Nigeria’s Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, said Nigerian investors are looking to the wider Caribbean, particularly for collaboration in sectors such as agriculture.
“Africa is ready, not only to trade with the Caribbean, but to build resilient food systems in the Caribbean,” he said.
Listen to the opening ceremony here.
Get updates here on the week of activities.
Click here for photographs.
Access videos here.
About the Caribbean Week of Agriculture
The Caribbean Week of Agriculture (CWA) is the premier event on the regional agricultural calendar. It is a roving event hosted by CARICOM Member States and Associate Members and includes seminars, key meetings, a special meeting of the Council for Trade and Economic Development (COTED), and an exhibition.
The CWA was conceptualised by the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) as a facility to place agriculture and rural life on the front burner of regional integration activities and in doing so enable:
- the key decision-makers in the public and private sectors to better acknowledge the importance of agriculture and rural life to the economic, social, and environmental stability of the region; and
- for the major stakeholders in agriculture and related sectors to have an opportunity to dialogue and forge a common vision for the repositioning of agriculture and the enhancement of rural life.
The CWA is convened under the aegis of the Alliance for Sustainable Development of Agriculture and the Rural Milieu (The Alliance). From the inaugural meeting in 1998, the two main collaborating agencies were IICA and the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Secretariat.
In 2002, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the Caribbean Agricultural Research and Development Institute (CARDI) joined IICA and CARICOM to establish a core group which functions as the Secretariat of The Alliance. Since then, the four agencies have collaborated on the management and logistics necessary for the convening and servicing of meetings of The Alliance as well as the myriad of activities during the CWA. The Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA) which was a joint international institution of the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States and the European Union (EU) from 1983 – 2020, was a major partner and sponsor of the CWA activities from 2003.
To date, there have been 18 successful editions of the CWA. The first CWA was held in Trinidad and Tobago in 1999. Last year, St. Vincent and the Grenadines hosted the event.
