The Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Mining has embarked on a project to bolster the production of several local spices at over the next five years.

The project carries a price tag of US$22.6 million and will be executed through the Jamaica Agricultural Commodities Regulatory Authority (JACRA) with the support of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).

According to Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Mining Floyd Green, the aim is to cultivate at least 100 acres of pimento.

“In fact, this year we would have distributed about 7,000 pimento plants to help drive our pimento production,” he revealed during his address at the Spur Tree Spices Jamaica ‘Spice Up Di Ting’ Launch, held on May 1 at the Jamaica Promotions Corporation’s (JAMPRO) Kingston office.

JACRA also plans to improve the output of ginger and turmeric.

“We are working under that project to bring back significant growth in our ginger sector and our turmeric sector. If you don’t know, we have the best turmeric in the world. Again, it was largely harvested from the wild and we are now setting up nurseries to ensure that we can distribute these plants,” Minister Green explained.

The agriculture minister indicated that over the years, there have been some challenges with preserving the authenticity and production of scotch bonnet peppers, and as a result the Government is now actively addressing the issues.

“We have invested significant sums in relation to Bodles [Research Station in St Catherine] to establish two brand new greenhouses to really look at the rapid multiplication scheme for our scotch bonnet seeds,” Minister Green shared.

He added that the investment increased seed production from 20,000 seeds in 2022 to 50,000 in 2023.

The Ministry of Agriculture has also established a new greenhouse at the Montpelier Research Station in an effort to drive the production of red pepper and increase the number of seeds that are supplied to farmers and companies.

At present, the ministry is collaborating with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) to drive the rapid multiplication of seeds by establishing a database and seed technology facility, as well as training 25 personnel at an approximate cost of US$1 million.

“We want to ensure that we maintain that authentic scotch bonnet flavour profile. You can’t do it unless you have the database. You can’t do it unless you are recording the germplasms. You can’t do it unless you know exactly what is happening with your seed pool,” Minister Green explained.

In the meantime, he pointed that there is significant growth in onion production.

“Last year, we would have grown by 46 per cent.  I was looking at the figures this year and it appears that we would have grown in excess of 200 person in relation to the production of onions,” the minister stated.