Spicing things up!

Jun 11, 2010 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

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Two commendable governmental initiatives were unveiled last week. The first was a micro-financing scheme for single mothers. The second was a meeting by the Ministry of Agriculture to promote the growing of spices.
The first development, the micro-financing scheme for single parent mothers, shows that even when good intentions go askew by ill-conceived plans, the residual good intentions still allow for the initiative to be salvaged at a later date.
The government sometime last year had announced a plan to help single parents. But the plan was not well thought out. No sooner did the government announce that it was seeking to provide help to this category of persons, it was swamped with thousands of persons registering as single parents, thereby making inadequate the sums set aside for assistance under the original plan.
The government has however learnt from its mistakes. It has retraced its steps. It has now opted to increase the resources being allocated to single mothers. Instead of 200 million dollars, some 500 million dollars are now being set aside to provide micro-credit to single mothers so that they can engage in some activity that would allow them to earn money. While that cannot build a highway to a hydro, it can create a great deal of opportunities for our single mothers.
While this new scheme is not the long-term solution to the empowerment of women, it is a step in the right direction. The government should be applauded for this stop-gap measure that will go a long way towards assisting single mothers to earn a livelihood. These mothers will now be able to undertake some enterprise that would allow them to earn some additional income and help provide for their families.
What is attractive about the program is that unlike other micro-credit schemes, this one allows them to source significantly higher financing at an extremely low rate of interest. Other micro-credit schemes have been plagued by high rates of interest. Despite micro-financing having a good track record when it comes to repayments, the high interest rates previously existing on small loans presented a real burden to low income households.
This present arrangement carries a low interest rate of 6% and no collateral is required as security. It can hardly get better. This is good news for those seeking small loans. The bank that will be administering this scheme should prepare itself for an avalanche of applications.
The low interest rate being offered has been facilitated by an amendment passed in the National Assembly which gives a tax break to companies offering micro-financing. A great deal of thought no doubt went into this process and the government must be commended not just for offering the facility, but more importantly, for its foresight in ensuring that low interest rates are afforded to those single mothers who will qualify for the micro-credit loans.
The second development of note over the past week was the announcement by the Ministry of Agriculture to push the production of spices. The ministry has long been talking about diversification. Many years ago there was a plan to push mushroom production. There was also a plan to further fish farms. But both of these plans involved serious financing demands and therefore it was not easy to convince small farmers to graduate to these areas.
The future of Guyana’s agriculture however depends on the extent to which it can be diversified. Spices are a segment of that agricultural diversification. The beauty about spices is that they can be grown on both a large scale and a small scale and thus can be a tool to help reduce poverty and increase exports. And this is why this latest development by the Ministry of Agriculture is so exciting. It allows farmers who may wish to test the local production of spices to do so on a small experimental scale before encouraging large scale production. Spices it is believed can be profitably grown on a small scale in Guyana but will require careful tending and knowledge of how to grow them in our soils and humidity.
The Ministry of Agriculture should not lose sight of the single mothers as a target group for the growth of spices. The Ministry of Agriculture should work along with the Ministry of Human Services to identify possible single mothers who have kitchen gardens. They should work along with those single mothers who may be interested in engaging in spice production and should provide the necessary information, training and support to encourage single mothers to engage in spice production.
It will help to link the single parents’ assistance to the diversification process in agriculture while empowering female-headed households and providing employment for our women.
A great many of the single mothers are going to try their hand at hairdressing, cosmetology, cake-making, craft, vending and sewing. These are areas which are already crowded in Guyana and are not booming micro-enterprise sectors.
The single mothers need to be encouraged to venture into non-traditional micro-enterprises of which small scale spice production can be included. It will make a difference in their lives and help lift them our single mothers out of poverty and dependence.

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