Government to Spend $200 Million on Farm Roads

The Government will be spending $200 million to repair farm roads, says Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Mining, Hon. Floyd Green.

Of the sum, $130 million has been set aside to repair roads in the Blue Mountain coffee belt, including areas in St. Andrew Eastern and West Rural, and sections of Portland and St. Thomas.

The remaining $70 million will be used to repair 51 farm roads in other sections of the island under the Hurricane Beryl Recovery Programme.

Providing an update on the ongoing Hurricane Beryl Recovery Programme in the House of Representatives on September 24, Mr. Green said the work should start on those 51 roads in the next few weeks.

“These projects are small road rehabilitation projects, so we have asked the teams to go out, and where they have identified roads that would have suffered some damage from Hurricane Beryl, especially those farm roads which were done over the last few years, we have asked that the information be passed to us so that we can do some remedial work, because we do not want to lose the gains that we have made,” the Minister said.

He pointed out that the $200 million is in addition to the existing $670 million earmarked for the farm road rehabilitation project.

“We are going to do the additional 51 roads, but we have already earmarked 46 roads to be done, 21 of those roads have already been contracted. From our original farm road programme, roads are being done in Thatch Walk to Norwood in St. Ann, Cocoa in Northern St. Elizabeth, Aldelphi Mountain in St James, Stewart Mountain, St Mary, and Post Road Phase 3 in Clarendon. That is happening as we speak,” the Minister said.