Tweet
Alternate subject heading: Jamaica's salvation is in AGRICULTURE!
Given 2 realities:
1) sub-$50 oil will likely never come back for whatever reason
2) WTO globalization rules that we signed up to have straight jacketed us so that subsidies and price controls are not feasible long term options. If done, it would come straight out of the GOJ coffers and increase the already too high national debt.
I would level with the people and tell them that we cant go on delaying the reckoning day. We have to delay instant gratification and hold strain. I would do some rescue efforts for the VERY poorest, as we want no one to die of starvation, but realistically, consumers will have to pay the piper...for now.
I would sell my medium term vision, where we expect to be in 3 years.
1) We IMMEDIATLY move to growing Jatropha (even sounds like our plant...Jah give it to Jamaica, LoL) and castor on massive scales on marginal lands to provide us with bio-diesel in 2 years, plus fertilizers and industrial dies. This will in the long term help us to reclaim lands lost to soil erosion and will boost yields on cash crops that are threatened by vermin. Other crops like the macuna bean can be grown to support the soil (it reinserts Nitrogen in the soil) and reduce dependence on commercial (imported, oil based) fertilizers.
2) We run to Brazil and have them accelerate our sugar cane ethanol projects, even asking their Govt for aid to accelerate the programme to be on line in 1 year max. We can sweeten the deal by importing cheap vehicles from Brazil with ethanol/flex engines with low import duties.
3) We cut the duty on diesel cars in half (at least) to incentivise their import over petrol equivalents. We cut taxes on bio-diesel sales while RAISING taxes on oil derived diesel sold through fuel stations. Farmers should pay even less for their bio-diesel for use in their farm vehicles, just as they do in Europe!
4) We seek to boost domestic production of corn and other wheat/corn substitues for use as edible staples and for animal feed. Higher prices should make them more attractive to produce.
5) We start a programme to reprocess frying oils, machine oils and other bio-hazard discard oils where applicable into bio-diesel!!! An additional offshoot of this process is ---MORE fertilizers as by products!!!
All these things take minimal capital but maximum ORGANIZATION...our perennial bugbear. But now we have no choice. With our backs against the wall, we have to wake up and use our POWER. The power to change, the power to conceive plan and execute for the betterment of our country, we all profess to love. We know we can do these things, as they are not conceptually difficult and we have conquered the world in many endeavours. Sport is but one shining example that we can do anything that we really desire.
Finally, all this can be done while pursuing other areas of importance, like addressing crime and corruption, wooing investment, revamping and improving education and training, rejuvenating the Justice system, repositioning Tourism, upgrading public transport and logistics, protecting and bolstering the environment, resocializing the population (the deiant part), creating jobs in other sectors than the traditional ones, managing the finances, restructuring the tax system over time, getting serious about Sport and Culture, reindustrializing in logical niches where we have competitive advantages, restructuring local government, rewriting the rules on governance, and forming strategic alliances with key foreign partners (less Caricom, more Brazil, India, China).
Given 2 realities:
1) sub-$50 oil will likely never come back for whatever reason
2) WTO globalization rules that we signed up to have straight jacketed us so that subsidies and price controls are not feasible long term options. If done, it would come straight out of the GOJ coffers and increase the already too high national debt.
I would level with the people and tell them that we cant go on delaying the reckoning day. We have to delay instant gratification and hold strain. I would do some rescue efforts for the VERY poorest, as we want no one to die of starvation, but realistically, consumers will have to pay the piper...for now.
I would sell my medium term vision, where we expect to be in 3 years.
1) We IMMEDIATLY move to growing Jatropha (even sounds like our plant...Jah give it to Jamaica, LoL) and castor on massive scales on marginal lands to provide us with bio-diesel in 2 years, plus fertilizers and industrial dies. This will in the long term help us to reclaim lands lost to soil erosion and will boost yields on cash crops that are threatened by vermin. Other crops like the macuna bean can be grown to support the soil (it reinserts Nitrogen in the soil) and reduce dependence on commercial (imported, oil based) fertilizers.
2) We run to Brazil and have them accelerate our sugar cane ethanol projects, even asking their Govt for aid to accelerate the programme to be on line in 1 year max. We can sweeten the deal by importing cheap vehicles from Brazil with ethanol/flex engines with low import duties.
3) We cut the duty on diesel cars in half (at least) to incentivise their import over petrol equivalents. We cut taxes on bio-diesel sales while RAISING taxes on oil derived diesel sold through fuel stations. Farmers should pay even less for their bio-diesel for use in their farm vehicles, just as they do in Europe!
4) We seek to boost domestic production of corn and other wheat/corn substitues for use as edible staples and for animal feed. Higher prices should make them more attractive to produce.
5) We start a programme to reprocess frying oils, machine oils and other bio-hazard discard oils where applicable into bio-diesel!!! An additional offshoot of this process is ---MORE fertilizers as by products!!!
All these things take minimal capital but maximum ORGANIZATION...our perennial bugbear. But now we have no choice. With our backs against the wall, we have to wake up and use our POWER. The power to change, the power to conceive plan and execute for the betterment of our country, we all profess to love. We know we can do these things, as they are not conceptually difficult and we have conquered the world in many endeavours. Sport is but one shining example that we can do anything that we really desire.
Finally, all this can be done while pursuing other areas of importance, like addressing crime and corruption, wooing investment, revamping and improving education and training, rejuvenating the Justice system, repositioning Tourism, upgrading public transport and logistics, protecting and bolstering the environment, resocializing the population (the deiant part), creating jobs in other sectors than the traditional ones, managing the finances, restructuring the tax system over time, getting serious about Sport and Culture, reindustrializing in logical niches where we have competitive advantages, restructuring local government, rewriting the rules on governance, and forming strategic alliances with key foreign partners (less Caricom, more Brazil, India, China).
- Good read, sah!
Comment