After you travel the thirty five miles from Charity you arrive at the mouth of the Wakapau Creek. Afterwards you travel a further fifteen miles inland, before you finally arrive at Wakapau, the community. All told, Wakapau comprises seventeen tiny islands and is bordered by Akawini to the south and Manawarin to the west. Wakapau houses one of the largest Amerindian communities in Region Two, Pomeroon-Supernam. It is, to say the least, a geographic conundrum. Time and circumstances confined the Stabroek Business’ visit to just one of those seventeen islands, Massarie, where we met with the community’s amiable Toshao, Lloyd Pereira.
Wakapau is a fairly ordered community. The residents plant coffee, pineapple, bitter cassava, yam, eddo, and coconut. This is what, mostly, keeps the community of around 2,000 residents going. About 300 of them are farmers. Bitter cassava is key to the livelihoods in the community. It is the critical ingredient in the production of Cassava Bread, Cassareep and Cassava Starch. These products are mostly sold at the Charity Market on the Essequibo Coast. Mondays are lively days at Wakapau. Sizeable numbers of shopkeepers, agro-processors and pensioners leave the community at around 06:00 hrs for Charity. They spend much of the day there, trading and shopping. They get to Charity either in their own small boats or they travel with the larger substantive passenger boat.
Travel by speedboat to Charity will set you back $2,500.00 per one-way trip. Charity Market is the landmark coastal trading post in the Region. The buyers and sellers converge there in their hundreds. They come from as far as Moruca and of course from the capital, Georgetown. The conventional wisdom in the trading environment there is that some of the best deals are to be had at Charity on Mondays. The farmers and agro processors from the Pomeroon bring their cassava bread, cassava casareep, and cassava starch. Some of the best bargains reportedly come from Wakapau so that the presence at Charity of traders from that community lend a particular liveliness to the environment. Their products sold, the Wakapau vendors would purchase vegetables, chicken, bread, and other household items before making their way back home at the end of the trading day.
Exposure to this environment makes one acutely aware of the fact that we in Guyana, frequently, are acutely unaware of ‘how the other half lives.’ On our way to Wakapau, news reached us that a fallen tree had blocked the access creek. Toshao Pereira, clearly in touch with the options that derive from such ‘emergencies’ recommended an alternative route… via the Wakapau Creek. The boat Captain complied with an unfussy efficiency, expertly maneuvering the vessel through the ‘shortcut’ which, for the most part, was not any wider than the vessel in which we were traveling. At the points of narrow ‘twists and turns’ we proceeded with a painstaking gingerliness that resulted in zero collisions with some of the formidable portions of earlier fallen trees that lay fastened and menacing in the corners of the ‘short cut’ creek in which we were traveling. Toshao
Lloyd sought to assure the uninitiated that trees ‘coming down’ into the Creek had become something of a norm. He explained that once word of such an occurrence reached the Village Council, four or five men would be mobilized to “sort it out.” They would travel to the particular location and remove the fallen tree, the complexity of the particular job determining the length of time that it took to get it done. The degree of difficulty in effecting the removal job, the Toshao explained, depended in large measure on the length and size of the fallen tree. It is this that dictates the logistical approach to removing it. Boat captains are constantly on the lookout for fallen trees which have been known, on occasion, to result in accidents, including fatal ones.
The rains had been unkind just prior to our arrival at Wakapau. There are occasions on which the outcomes of the attendant flooding were catastrophic. The Toshao recalled an earlier period during which floods had banished the farmers from the land for about two years. Valued markets had been lost and up to the time when we had visited agricultural pursuits had still not fully returned to a condition of normalcy. Bitter cassava is usually planted twice yearly, in April and August. The cultivated crop had to be left to mature for around nine months. Toshao Pereira explained that the two-year hiatus had resulted in the loss of critical markets for cassava bread, casareep and cassava starch. Up to this time, he said, the community has still not recovered completely. There is, he said, still a shortage of bitter cassava.
The community may just be starting to turn the proverbial corner. The villagers are receiving some orders for the various products though satisfying demand continues to be a challenge. In the instance of the cassava-based products, it was the damage to the cultivated cassava and the shortage of ‘sticks’ for replanting that was the problem. It is anticipated that the raw materials, including cassava, necessary to produce the goods that are critical to the economic life of the community, will become routinely available by December. A year prior, the Stabroek Business was told, the community was unable to supply cassava casareep to the Charity Market and that what little casareep was available had been manufactured from coconut. We inquired as to how residents had “seen through” the difficult period. Many of the fathers and sons, the Toshao told us, made a b-line for ‘the bush’ in search of work in the gold mining sector. For many families those earnings covered two years of tough times.
Women are responsible for the entire process associated with the manufacture of cassava bread… reaping, peeling and grating the cassava, removing the valued juice and finally, baking the cassava bread. These days, we were told, men are becoming increasingly involved in the production process. The grating of the cassava is considered by far, the most onerous chore. The Toshao who confided in us that he was usually pressed into service in that regard by his wife, told the Stabroek Business that it could take as much as an entire day to grate 400 pounds of cassava. The ordeal of the manual option has encouraged some modest investments in motorized graters which can ‘polish off’ the same 400 pounds of cassava in around twenty minutes. Needless to say the motorized equipment could set the buyer back between $30,000 and $50,000, a circumstance which accounts for the fact that the manual grater remains the more frequently used tool, its ‘awkwardness’ notwithstanding.
Toshao Pereira told the Stabroek Business that the Village Council has submitted request to the Ministry of Amerindian Affairs for equipment that will render the cassava grating process less onerous. For the most part, farming at Wakapau remains a predominantly manual pursuit. The farmers use mostly cutlasses and hoes for land preparation. Once an area is used for two crops the farmers set that area aside and move elsewhere. New lands are culled from the forest, the trees removed and the site burnt. The burnt remains are cleared and the new farmland becomes available. One may think that the land acquisition methods employed by the farmers here do not proceed within the strictest confines of environmental laws. Clearing a two-acre plot can cost in the region of $75 000. The farmers at Wakapau say that they would like to try both new crops and new farming techniques. They are also looking for markets for their produce and storage facilities for the crops, especially pineapples, given it is a perishable crop.
Toshao Pereira says he would like to see Agricultural Officers visit Wakapau regularly to guide farmers. He talks about looking at other crops for planting that will make the people of Wakapau self-sufficient. The Village Council, he told the Stabroek Business, is contemplating vegetable cultivation and is also contemplating the use of shade house farming for the cultivation of vegetables. After the last flood, cassava sticks became difficult to acquire. As a response, the Toshao said that the community was seeking help in setting up a plant nursery primarily though not exclusively for cassava sticks. The soil is also useful for pineapple cultivation. Given that the soil is sandy, it is excellent for pineapples. Some farmers are cultivating pineapple though uncertain market demand has placed restraints on the pursuit. Some of the farmers sell their pineapples to a local wholesaler planting pineapples, but more market is needed to encourage more farmers to plant pineapples.
Toshao Pereira said some farmers sell their pineapples to a wholesaler who takes them ‘to market’ in Georgetown. If farming is to prosper in the community it would need to acquire storage facilities… and quickly. Some of the farmers are also planting coffee. Macushi ants are the bane of the farmers’ existence. Overnight, they can lay waste to an entire farm. During a visit to the community by Agriculture Minister Zulfikar Mustapha, the farmers had received allocations of ant bait. Toshao Pereira has served several terms. He evinces a genuine interest in the community which he serves. He is married to Jacqueline and the couple have two adult children. Jacqueline, who as a Senior Mistress, is now involved in the production and marketing of cassava bread and casareep.
