By: Staff Writer
July 30, 2024
President of Guyana, Dr Irfaan Ali said at the launch of the Regional Economic Agri Insurance Programme (REAP) that after all of the destruction caused by Hurricane Beryl in Grenada and with a flood event in Guyana that government’s are faced with “tremendous difficulties,” and must “build back with the future in sight.”
Ali, also said: “I want to single out FAO (Food and Agricultural Organisation) and IICA (Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture) for the tremendous work that they have been doing, not only in helping us to mitigate challenges and build infrastructure, but they have been doing some very important technical work in preparing the ground for are the type of sector we want to build in the future.”
Direct payouts for production expenses and business disruptions are provided by REAP’s insurance products. The primary goals of the Caribbean Community’s Special Ministerial Task Force on Food Production and Food Security are similar to that of REAP’s mission, which is to encourage healthy eating habits, increase food security, and maintain financial resilience throughout the Region.
Ali added: “I want to also say that very early after Hurricane Beryl, I made a few comments on the impact for the region for vision 25 by 2025. But more importantly, the situation farmers were placed at and governments because governments are faced with tremendous difficulties after these challenging situations, even Guyana, in 2005, we lost 60 percent of our GDP with a flood in one event. And that is just looking at the impact on agriculture. But when we have health care, education, community life and infrastructure disrupted, it also means that government must now redirect resources they may have for agriculture, and to support agriculture, for this critical infrastructure. And sometimes we don’t, we don’t pay enough emphasis on that cost. In the business world, we will say it is lost opportunity is where you forego one opportunity because of a prevailing priority.”
Further adding that many of the countries affected by Beryl may not have had a significant amount allocated to invest in agriculture, whatever it was must now be redirected to help other sectors rebound from Beryl.
Ali also said: “So it’s not only the financial impact, because many times people focus on the financial impact. But it’s the whole economic modeling that is disrupted when you have these challenges. So, as we build back, we have to build back with the future in sight.”
Ali also said: “If we can bank a business plan with good research and data, then we make it easier for the farmers to have access to the banking sector.”
Adding to this, the President stated that the integration of technology with livelihoods, and financial instruments are also essential.
Ali added: “When we first started this journey, just finding an interesting insurance product was difficult…I would encourage you to formalise a product to now open the wings and to invite all the other brokers, all insurance companies…So that we cover the region.”