MP Khadijah Ameen Urges Public To Support Local Farmers
Roman Catholics around the world are celebrating the Feast of Corpus Christi on Thursday.
While Corpus Christi remains a deeply religious observance in Trinidad and Tobago, the public holiday is also synonymous with the tradition of planting.
In honour of this enduring annual custom, Member of Parliament for St Augustine Khadijah Ameen distributed hundreds of seedlings to citizens.
« With our policy in agriculture and Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar speaks about our ability to feed ourselves as a nation, that all our children must be involved. So as we give away these seedlings today, it is part of encouraging people to grow their own food. And certainly, whether you choose to do it in your backyard or in a little flowerpot in your living room, you can, in fact, harvest tomatoes, ochro, melongene, parsley. We encourage people to plant their own seedlings. »
MP Ameen made a special appeal to members of the public to buy local.
« I know the hard work that our farmers put in and therefore I am appealing to the public on this Corpus Christi Day as we plant and we celebrate and we encourage our children to plant, I encourage you to make the choice to buy something that is local as opposed to something that is imported, even though it might look prettier but it is important for us to support our own agriculture sector. »
Noting that St Augustine is home to a significant farming community, MP Ameen said Agriculture Minister Ravi Ratiram supported the initiative by providing the seedlings.
« The Minister of Agriculture has been on the ground with us. He visited some of my agriculture areas with the president of our agriculture association here in St Augustine to look at our roads, our access roads, the floodgates, where we need improvement so that we could help to improve the conditions that farmers are working under so that it will mean more local food available to feed our country, and, of course, later on to reduce the food import bill. »
