Former minister of Agriculture Earl Deveaux said that on the one hand, farmers are unaware of how to access government help – and on the other, are finding government interference a hindrance.
"We don't have the kind of support with respect to extension and technical assistance," Mr Deveaux said. "The ministry doesn't tell us 'no' on anything we ask for, but there is no policy environment that lets us know the best way to access government support."
Meanwhile, Bahamian farmers are finding it more and more difficult to obtain the labour they need to run their businesses.
Although not a major problem for Mr Deveaux at Lucayan Tropical Produce, a hydroponic farm, he admitted that other farmers are having a hard time obtaining immigration permits for labourers.
He said the problems with the immigration process include the lack of transparency, the inability to know with any certainty what the outcome will be, and the time it takes to get a straight answer. We don't need subsidies – what we really need is the government to do their job and just get out of our way," said Ian Goodfellow, owner of GoodFellows Farms.
With large supplier contracts like Atlantis and soon to be BahaMar, Mr Goodfellow says it is difficult to take on the new business.
"We can't increase the size of our farm – we have the land, we have the money, we have the demand and we have the facilities, but the problem is we can't get the labour," Mr Goodfellow said.
Mr Goodfellow explained that after 22 years of providing the College of the Bahamas with an internship training facility, he has never had a Bahamian student. They have to work in the fields and learn how to actually put the seeds in the ground, but "when you say they have to go out there and work beside ﾠthese Haitians for six months they don't want to hear about it… they don't want to do it," Mr Good= ﾠfellow said.
Mr Deveaux added that the process of obtaining work permits is very slow for non-Bahamians, but "if the Department of Labour is refusing applications for work permits for non-Bahamians, then they should have a group of Bahamians that they can refer you to – rather than assuming that you weren't looking to hire people."
"If I am running a business and I am looking to hire a Haitian, it must be reasonable to assume that
I have tried to get some Bahamians who just weren't forthcoming," he said.
Another Bahamian farmer, Dr Wendy Stuart, said she got too frustrated with the red tape involve in working with the government and government subsidies. As for getting more Bahamians involved, Dr Stuart said her preference is to hire – Bahamians if she can find them to work.
"Farming internships like that between COB and GoodFellows didn't work out because they didn't get any response from the Bahamian community. I wish Bahamians would take advantage of the opportunity," she said.
According to Mr. Goodfellow, who has been farming in The Bahamas for a number of years: "Right now because of the politics, they don't really care about the jobs. What they care about right now is this word of 'let's get rid of all the Haitians.' Not that they're going to do it because they all realise that its impossible to do and they're never going to do it, but it sounds good for the middle class Bahamian who's tired of seeing the schools filled up with Haitians and tired of hearing about, the hospitals and schools being clogged up."
The bottom line, Mr Goodfellow said is "as farmers we're here to provide a food supply – let's get above this and get on with it."
By KRISTINA MCNEIL, The Tribune
