Agriculture stakeholders on Monday met to identify food safety and fisheries needs for the development of a country action plan for an 11.7M Euro European Union-funded regional project that facilitates Cariforum states improved access to international markets. A release from the Government Informa-tion Agency (GINA) said that the consultation opened by George Jarvis, Permanent Secretary, Min-istry of Agriculture, at Cara Lodge aimed at creating and strengthening the regional and national sanitary and phyto-sanitary measures under the project.
The project, ‘Support to the Caribbean Forum of ACP States in the implementation of commitments undertaken under the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA); Sani-tary and Phyto-sanitary (SPS) measures,’ is expected to be implemented in 42 months. George Jarvis, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture, opened the local consultation at Cara Lodge. Also in attendance were Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agricul-ture’s (IICA) Representa-tive in Guyana Wilmot Garnet, Programme Man-ager, Agriculture and Industry at the Caribbean Community (Caricom), Nisa Surujbally and Manager, Dr Robert Ahern, Agricultural Health and Food Safety Pro-gramme, IICA and June Masters, Statistics and Information Analyst, Car-ibbean Regional Fisheries Mechanism (CRFM).
According to Jarvis, Guyana welcomed the project as it seeks to “strengthen our legislation and provide the necessary and important capacity improvement to our present planting and animal system that will lead us to meet international standards.” He noted that the project will also provide “the kind of
