Tomatoes — $12 a pound

THIS WEEKEND’s visit to the market will prove more costly than usual, since heavy rainfall and flooding in Central and some parts of North-East Trinidad wreaked havoc on agricultural produce, leaving farmers with nothing to reap. Root crops and tree crops alike suffered from last week’s inclement weather. Farmers united in their call for something to be done to alleviate the problem, which would ease their distress and  prevent them from suffering such significant losses. Prices varied on agricultural produce with some of the more popularly demanded crops, like tomatoes, reaching a wholesale price of $6.61 per kg for small, $8.81 per kg for medium and $14.33 per kg for large ones. Retail prices were  $8 per lb for small, $10 per lb for medium and $12 per lb for large.

Lettuce, one of the favoured green leafy vegetables that adorns our plate at lunch time on Sunday, or even that sandwich we prepare for work, now carries a wholesale price of  $1, $3 and $5 per head for small, medium and large, and $2, $5, and $7 retail. Large pimentos cost two for $1, hot peppers two for $1, rolled dasheen bush $4, open bush $3 and ochro five for $1. Root crops such as carrots, cassava, dasheen, local eddoes and foreign eddoes have all increased. A Toco woman, who refused to give her name, said that she has been in the market for over 20 years and usually bought produce from the small island vendors to retail. She said she could not remember a time when she could not get stocks from them, but after what happened with Hurricane Ivan in the Caribbean, she saw the possibility of losing her market, if something is not done to help farmers better protect their crops from the element.

This concern followed the realisation that Hurricane Ivan had caused severe damage to tree crops in St Vincent and had totally devastated crops in Grenada, leaving the local markets with a low supply of sapodilla, soursop, sugar apple and spices among other things. With respect to the high prices, CEO of the National Agricultural Management and Development Company (Namdevco), Samaroo Dowlath, said that this is to be expected given the type of losses farmers experienced as a result of the widespread flooding in some areas. However, he noted that Namdevco, and the Ministry of Consumer Affairs and the Consumer Guidance Institute, was working on launching a programme to assist consumers with creating healthy cost effective meals, as well as listing the best prices of fruits, root crops and tree crops by the end of this month. He noted that this project was in keeping with Namdevco’s continued drive to have people eat healthier and to maintain food prices in the local markets.