The growth of the Bullnose pepper project has been stunted by flood and disease and it has returned to a seedling stage and is likely to be replaced with Brazilian pepper.

The pepper project, which began early last year, is part of a non-traditional agricultural diversification scheme undertaken by the Ministry of Agriculture. At the time of the pepper project’s launching at Parika, East Bank Essequibo, it was stated that the first phase would involve the cultivation of one acre of plants by each farmer with the acreage set to increase further. The second and third phases were to have come on stream this year and would have seen the addition of more farmers and the tripling of the total number of acres under production. The produce would have been exported.

But the project at Parika was grounded by flooding and the plants became diseased, the Guyana Trade and Investment Support (GTIS) Business Development Services Manager Vijay Rambrich said. GTIS is overseeing the project. Rambrich told Stabroek News that the agency was in the process of restarting the venture with an experimental farm at Timehri, East Bank Demerara.

He explained that in addition to the flooding, the Parika portion encountered the problem of mites, which attacked the plants in the rainy season as a consequence of which the crop was lost.

Two varieties, the Bullnose pepper and the Brazilian hot pepper were now being experimented with at Timehri. Rambrich stated that the Bullnose was being grown through net cultivation, under plastic, with mulch and drip irrigation. The Brazilian pepper was being grown under similar conditions. He said that they were trying to get a new variety of pepper that would survive in this climate and were looking to replace the Bullnose pepper with the Brazilian variety.

The Bullnose peppers were also being cultivated on the West Coast Berbice and at Linden but they had been “forced to ease up on it.”  Rambrich said that the plants were not bearing at the required size or market weight because they were being grown in the open. He disclosed that only about 30% of the produce was of the required size and that that was not a feasible quantity for export purposes.

Meanwhile, as regards the Butternut squash, the cultivation of which was also part of the diversification programme, Rambrich said it was still being grown but not in large quantities. He explained that obstacles had been encountered there too. “I don’t think they [farmers] are ready to do them in large quantities,” he commented. He remarked that those crops were being grown by the farmers “like normal pumpkin” and the sizes of the produce were small.

At present, he said, the agency was focusing on the experimental farm at Timehri, where farmers could visit and learn the best way to grow the crops. He went on to say that the crops being focused on would not be grown in commercial quantities until the various obstacles had been overcome. The produce reaped so far had been sold on the local market and GTIS was looking to breathe new life into the programme.

When the pepper project was announced in 2007, it was stated that it was part of a market-led strategy − a new approach to the export of non-traditional agriculture products from Guyana − being pursued by the Ministry of Agriculture. The first phase would have seen the farmers cultivating one acre each of the pepper and the second and third phases would have involved the addition of more farmers and the tripling of the total number of acres under continuous production to 180, which was forecast to produce 30,000 pounds of export quality peppers to be shipped every week. When the project reached full capacity it was expected that the country would have exported about 1.5 million pounds per year, with an estimated annual value of US$750,000.

The project is a Government of Guyana /United States Agency for International Development (USAID) one, undertaken through the collaboration of agencies including the Ministry of Agriculture, the National Agriculture Re-search Institute (NARI), the Poor Rural Communities Support Services (PRCSSP), the New Guyana Marketing Corporation (GMC), USAID and GTIS.