Through courses in agro-processing, Bahamians are being taught to turn surplus tomatoes into ketchup and pizza sauce.
An initiative of Bahamas Agricultural and Industrial Corporation (BAIC), participants from five islands took the latest month-long course which ended last week.
They were taught by food processing expert Donna Marie Bromfield, secretary of the Jamaica Agro Processors Association, and vice president of Jamaica’s National Food Standards Committee.
She was accompanied by BAIC’s senior food processing officer Tonjia Burrows, who demonstrated testing equipment needed to ensure quality control.
Presentations were also made on sanitation and food hygiene in ensuring food safety.
Mrs Bromfield said she was encouraged by the response of participants from Abaco, Long Island, Exuma, Andros, and Eleuthera.
“They were all very receptive,” said Mrs Bromfield, a 20-year veteran in the agro-processing industry. “They are all eager to go. They are poised to take off.
“But, without them having a facility in place they cannot do much more because they are operating from their kitchens now.”
Products created included ketchup, spicy tomato jam, pizza sauce, fresh lime juice, and candied lime peel.
“It was a total package we had for them, but for anyone who is now going to say ‘I want to do this further’ would need specialised attention.”
Opportunities in agro-industry lie in processing tomatoes, onions, limes, coconuts, pineapples, mangoes, guavas, potatoes, bananas, plantains and peppers.
She told of producing pastes, pickles, juices, cheeses, chips, flour, cereals, oils, and milk products, among other new items, locally.
She promised to approach the Jamaica Bureau of Standards to take on any testing of products from The Bahamas.
Agro-processing is a key element in the government’s thrust toward food security.
Toward that end, the Ministry of Agriculture and Marine Resources, through BAIC, has conducted a series of Family Island training by its unit responsible for value added activities.
“I see a lot of promise,” said BAIC executive chairman Edison Key. He received Mrs Bromfield’s report last week. He also sampled some of the products. “I love it.”
“We are pleased that you can come in and share some of your expertise with us,” he told her. “Food processing is something we are really trying to move again here in The Bahamas.”
As a former commercial farmer, he recalled when The Bahamas grew and processed fruits and vegetables for export.
“This is the direction I hope that we can move towards while we develop the agricultural sector to tie it in to food processing,” he said.
“We are making some progress but we still import up to $500 million worth of food, a lot of which we can produce here in these islands.
“We see food processing as a major player in not only job creation, but also in the establishment of sound careers in related fields.
“There is nothing more important to a country than food.”
BAIC’s assistant general manager for agriculture, Arnold Dorsett, said he was pleased with the results.
“This demonstration shows that we can produce good quality, reasonably-priced products right here in The Bahamas from locally grown produce.
“We have a lot of surplus that we are losing because we are not processing, and this initiative is to utilise that surplus.”
By Gladstone Thurston
Bahamas Information Services
