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Rich land, poor nation! Food matters
PM, please rid us of Air Vanity!
Franklin Johnston
Friday, October 30, 2009
Jamaica is an enigma. We are too rich to be called poor yet not rich enough to ditch our begging bowl. Our shameless leaders choose to borrow others' labour (their money) than to mobilise ours, it's déjà vu. We are tired of talk. We are not expecting instant success; we just need to be shown a vision and some timelines for things to happen! We are a rich country, but a poor nation with blessed poor people. We are in a crisis, but does the minister adjust his house repair budget? Does Cabinet reduce the MPs on the payroll? No! Will we continue to suffer? Yes!
Franklin Johnston
Poverty in Darfur and Ethiopia is deep - flies, excreta, stench, skin, bones and suffering. It is not pretty. Here, we have food we did not plant (mango, breadfruit, ackee). It falls and rots. And we have water in dams we did not build. In Africa, the poor walk miles for care and bury their medicine as they have no fridge to keep it cool. Are we really poor? Is our poverty contrived by bigger brains? Are we kept in want by a politics which profits from our dependence? We waited to be given freedom and we were handed Independence. Will we wait or fight for the economic freedom we pledged Father Manley to achieve?
Food
Europe and America used slaves effectively and have food and wealth to prove it. Arab and African slave states did not and still can't feed themselves. Slavery by itself is no guarantee of success, and we are living proof that neither is freedom. Mineral-rich Congo's people won't produce, so it gives white South Africans thousands of hectares of land to farm for 30 years and they will make millions selling tomatoes at half the present US$7 per lb. Why not invite them here? Minister Tufton needs prayers. Sir, we tried everything already - hope springs eternal! Jobs are few and our NINJA (No Income, No Job or Asset) cohort grows but won't produce. Here's some tweaking that might help:
. Grade and package produce. Sell Grade A and B - uniform in size, colour, shape, temperature and packaged - to supermarkets at premium prices; C and D - oversize and undersize - to the catering trade, and A and B loose at a low price to the market and street trade. Farmers would recoup from the top grades. Farmers need brand (as Trelawny Yam Guild), weight, batch, grade on a waybill, as in 2009, we need to know who vouches for the pork, tomato or yam and that it is not imported or stolen. The JAS should create a brand pool and validation marks for farmer groups.
. Enforce "sell-by" and "best-before" dates. The first is a health mark and the second a quality mark. Expired best-before food is healthy; expired sell-by is not always so, but consumers can choose carefully and get bargains and ease the burden.
. Genetically Modified crops are a blessing and a curse. All plants - all living things -mutate and evolve. The biodiversity around us is always in transition. Nature's changes take place over decades, man's to order. We make crops resistant to diseases, pests and yield more, etc, but these qualities may transfer to weeds too. With GM we buy seed for each crop, pay the IP and royalty fees of the scientists, but what of the side effects?
Food... produce, grade, package have 'sell-by' and 'best-before' dates
. We don't know how to cook good food fast. We waste energy with open flames, stew for hours and leach the value out of food. We haughtily aver we do not eat "stale food" (leftovers) as we don't know how to store, chill, freeze and restore food to freshness.
. Portion control is important. We believe in "full belly" but don't know a body's needs or what happens to food it cannot process. Restaurant food and box lunches are a rip-off. Are we served six oz protein (beef), 10 oz carbohydrate (yam, rice) and two oz vegetable as a meal with mass to deliver, say, 40 per cent of our daily calorific needs? Who knows?
. Food fraud grows in hard times. Sellers use "bait and switch", sell cheap as dear, low as high grade or cheap imports as local. We need traceability of all food back to source.
. Junk food is a moving target, like weeds. A weed is anything growing where it's not wanted. Salt, sugar and fats are junk to me - salt fish, salt pork, salt beef and fried stuff - as I am on my health journey; still, God bless roast yam and salt fish! Mind your junk too!
. Weight is the way to sell food. To sell by the dozen is criminal. Food value is by weight and volume and is verifiable. Our liquids and solids are traded in US and UK gallons, tons and tonnes. The consumer is ripped off, as these are not the same. The state must provide consumer alerts so we can check the value we receive. Every little helps!
Air Jamaica
We can't feed or educate our people, yet we spend all to parade our name on the side of an aeroplane Why? Vanity, simple vanity, my friends!
There is a difference between privatising and ridding ourselves of a national liability which cost us billions over 40 years; always said to be on the verge of being sustainable but never made it, like our economy. To buy a loss-making, vanity airline, with high debt and fuel costs in a global depression is a mega risk undertaken by fools or people of rare insight and deep pockets. Let's end the confusion about who made an offer. An offer means a Business and Finance Plan with a transition strategy, fronted by a deal expert on behalf of the offeror. He is armed with intents from an underwriting house and a strategy for the sovereign and subordinate debt. Plans may cost upwards of US$1m to prepare. His fees, in excess of US$3,000 an hour, plus expenses and a success fee may be two per cent of the deal. It's easy to spot an offer as the cost of even the negotiator is a barrier to frivolous people. Incidentally, there is no vacuum in business and tourist demand for seats to Jamaica will elicit supply. Stay conscious!
Dr Franklin Johnston is an international project manager with Teape-Johnston Consultants, currently on assignment in the UK.
franklinjohnston@hotmail.com
http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/colum...D_MATTERS_.asp
PM, please rid us of Air Vanity!
Franklin Johnston
Friday, October 30, 2009
Jamaica is an enigma. We are too rich to be called poor yet not rich enough to ditch our begging bowl. Our shameless leaders choose to borrow others' labour (their money) than to mobilise ours, it's déjà vu. We are tired of talk. We are not expecting instant success; we just need to be shown a vision and some timelines for things to happen! We are a rich country, but a poor nation with blessed poor people. We are in a crisis, but does the minister adjust his house repair budget? Does Cabinet reduce the MPs on the payroll? No! Will we continue to suffer? Yes!
Franklin Johnston
Poverty in Darfur and Ethiopia is deep - flies, excreta, stench, skin, bones and suffering. It is not pretty. Here, we have food we did not plant (mango, breadfruit, ackee). It falls and rots. And we have water in dams we did not build. In Africa, the poor walk miles for care and bury their medicine as they have no fridge to keep it cool. Are we really poor? Is our poverty contrived by bigger brains? Are we kept in want by a politics which profits from our dependence? We waited to be given freedom and we were handed Independence. Will we wait or fight for the economic freedom we pledged Father Manley to achieve?
Food
Europe and America used slaves effectively and have food and wealth to prove it. Arab and African slave states did not and still can't feed themselves. Slavery by itself is no guarantee of success, and we are living proof that neither is freedom. Mineral-rich Congo's people won't produce, so it gives white South Africans thousands of hectares of land to farm for 30 years and they will make millions selling tomatoes at half the present US$7 per lb. Why not invite them here? Minister Tufton needs prayers. Sir, we tried everything already - hope springs eternal! Jobs are few and our NINJA (No Income, No Job or Asset) cohort grows but won't produce. Here's some tweaking that might help:
. Grade and package produce. Sell Grade A and B - uniform in size, colour, shape, temperature and packaged - to supermarkets at premium prices; C and D - oversize and undersize - to the catering trade, and A and B loose at a low price to the market and street trade. Farmers would recoup from the top grades. Farmers need brand (as Trelawny Yam Guild), weight, batch, grade on a waybill, as in 2009, we need to know who vouches for the pork, tomato or yam and that it is not imported or stolen. The JAS should create a brand pool and validation marks for farmer groups.
. Enforce "sell-by" and "best-before" dates. The first is a health mark and the second a quality mark. Expired best-before food is healthy; expired sell-by is not always so, but consumers can choose carefully and get bargains and ease the burden.
. Genetically Modified crops are a blessing and a curse. All plants - all living things -mutate and evolve. The biodiversity around us is always in transition. Nature's changes take place over decades, man's to order. We make crops resistant to diseases, pests and yield more, etc, but these qualities may transfer to weeds too. With GM we buy seed for each crop, pay the IP and royalty fees of the scientists, but what of the side effects?
Food... produce, grade, package have 'sell-by' and 'best-before' dates
. We don't know how to cook good food fast. We waste energy with open flames, stew for hours and leach the value out of food. We haughtily aver we do not eat "stale food" (leftovers) as we don't know how to store, chill, freeze and restore food to freshness.
. Portion control is important. We believe in "full belly" but don't know a body's needs or what happens to food it cannot process. Restaurant food and box lunches are a rip-off. Are we served six oz protein (beef), 10 oz carbohydrate (yam, rice) and two oz vegetable as a meal with mass to deliver, say, 40 per cent of our daily calorific needs? Who knows?
. Food fraud grows in hard times. Sellers use "bait and switch", sell cheap as dear, low as high grade or cheap imports as local. We need traceability of all food back to source.
. Junk food is a moving target, like weeds. A weed is anything growing where it's not wanted. Salt, sugar and fats are junk to me - salt fish, salt pork, salt beef and fried stuff - as I am on my health journey; still, God bless roast yam and salt fish! Mind your junk too!
. Weight is the way to sell food. To sell by the dozen is criminal. Food value is by weight and volume and is verifiable. Our liquids and solids are traded in US and UK gallons, tons and tonnes. The consumer is ripped off, as these are not the same. The state must provide consumer alerts so we can check the value we receive. Every little helps!
Air Jamaica
We can't feed or educate our people, yet we spend all to parade our name on the side of an aeroplane Why? Vanity, simple vanity, my friends!
There is a difference between privatising and ridding ourselves of a national liability which cost us billions over 40 years; always said to be on the verge of being sustainable but never made it, like our economy. To buy a loss-making, vanity airline, with high debt and fuel costs in a global depression is a mega risk undertaken by fools or people of rare insight and deep pockets. Let's end the confusion about who made an offer. An offer means a Business and Finance Plan with a transition strategy, fronted by a deal expert on behalf of the offeror. He is armed with intents from an underwriting house and a strategy for the sovereign and subordinate debt. Plans may cost upwards of US$1m to prepare. His fees, in excess of US$3,000 an hour, plus expenses and a success fee may be two per cent of the deal. It's easy to spot an offer as the cost of even the negotiator is a barrier to frivolous people. Incidentally, there is no vacuum in business and tourist demand for seats to Jamaica will elicit supply. Stay conscious!
Dr Franklin Johnston is an international project manager with Teape-Johnston Consultants, currently on assignment in the UK.
franklinjohnston@hotmail.com
http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/colum...D_MATTERS_.asp
Confused....there is no salient point here...rambling.
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