Brent Eversely, a 31-year-old university student and agricultural entrepreneur began agricultural production in 2012.
His farm, which covers an area of one lot in Malabar, does its own processing, packaging and distribution.
Eversely and a team of other students grow fresh produce, which are usually imported, such as cherry tomatoes, coloured lettuce, and coloured sweet peppers.
The team cleans and packages their produce to sell in community supermarkets and most recently in a large popular supermarket chain.
He chooses to market and distribute privately because he said Namdevco cannot give him the price he needs.
Like other agricultural entrepreneurs, Eversely faced challenges in getting his crops started.
“We went to the Agriculture Development Bank (ADB) but we had some challenges. The requirements to start the business was a lot. If I need $100,000 to start then I had to have $100,000. If I had that then I wouldn’t need it,” said Eversely.
He eventually got a loan of $150,00 and intends to increase his production, but Eversley now faces the other challenges of land tenure and additional funding from the ADB.
He said the ADB makes it difficult for young people to get into farming.
This is one of the areas Rambharat said he had mandate the board to change.
He said after entering office in 2015, he found that there was little alignment between the government policies and the actual work of state enterprises such as Namdevco, ADB, and other state agencies under his ministry.
“Each of these boards have been given a very clear mandate. In terms of ADB and Namdevco, I have written to them and outlined my expectations. ADB must become more responsive to farmers in terms of the loans they offer, the terms of those loans, and the accessibility of the ADB officers. That they would do outreach in specific areas we want to see growth such as cocoa, coconuts, fisheries, hot peppers and pineapples, and agro processing.”
I have complaints from farmers about the inflexibility of the ADB. “As a minister I can’t run the bank, but I can talk to the board about government policy and ensuring what they do is in alignment with government policy.
“These sectors must belong to the farmers. This is not going to be a top-down approach. The ministry and the Government is here to support the sector, not create the sector.
“With reduced resources we must ensure that we are able to account for the financial allocation and that what we spent actually benefits farmers,” Rambharat said.