700,000 Farmers to Benefit from GCF Project Adapt Over Five Years

Approximately 700,000 farmers across six central parishes are set to benefit from a US$50-million Green Climate Fund (GCF) project, which aims to enhance climate resilience of vulnerable farmers over the next five years.

The project, titled ‘ADAPT Jamaica: Enhancing climate change resilience of vulnerable smallholders in Central Jamaica’, was approved on Friday (March 27).

It represents the first ever single-country climate investment that Jamaica has received from the GCF.

Minister of Water, Environment and Climate Change, Hon. Matthew Samuda, has indicated that approximately US$40 million of the approved sum will be grant financing.

He was speaking during a Special Press Conference at Jamaica House in Kingston on Monday (March 30).

Mr. Samuda noted that the Government is “actively pursuing an additional US $300 million [for] projects that are at varying stages of development”, and “over the coming months, a number of these will have announcements that we certainly believe will redound to the benefit of Jamaicans everywhere”.

The GCF project will be implemented in Trelawny, St. Ann, St. Elizabeth, Clarendon, St. Catherine, and Manchester – areas where climate risks and food security challenges are severe due to increased hurricanes, longer droughts and progressively erratic rainfall over the last two decades.

Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Mining, Hon. Floyd Green, explained that these areas face high climate exposure, rural poverty, food insecurity, land degradation, and limited access to irrigation and financing.

He noted that these parishes are responsible for a combined 70 per cent of Jamaica’s domestic agriculture production.

The implementation of the project at the farm level is designed to be practical, visible, and scalable, through the development of model farms and farm clusters.

Mr. Green explained that through these model farms, the Ministry will “deploy climate-resilient solutions…including things like solar-powered irrigation, reinforced greenhouses that are designed to withstand stronger storms [and] efficient water management systems such as drip irrigation, especially for our vulnerable farmers”.

The Minister said the project will have a strong training component and provide access to simple, affordable tools focused on rainwater harvesting and water-efficient technology.

“We will design a climate information system that will tie directly into our farmers… so our farmers are better equipped to know when we are having these weather changes. It will provide timely practical guidance on weather and crop conditions,” Mr. Green informed.

He noted that a portion of these funds will be routed through the Development Bank of Jamaica (DBJ) that smallholder farmers, have greater access to capital to be able to invest in their agricultural enterprise.

“We’ll focus on things like crop zoning, targeted inclusion strategies. We’re going to be focusing on our women. We’re [also] going to be focusing on our youth to ensure that underserved groups have equitable access,” the Minister outlined.

He added that the Ministry will be using its farmer field school to ensure that our farmers are trained in climate smart methodology.

Meanwhile, Mr. Green said a component was crafted into the project to ensure that the Ministry could directly respond to the damage caused by Hurricane Melissa, which led to more than $32 billion in losses to the country’s agricultural sector.

“We will be crafting some cash transfers. We will be looking to have households who will benefit from a cash-for-work programme, and we’re looking to develop a major irrigation system under this project. This project will bring forward at least nine automatic weather stations, 35 rainfall loggers, and a national climate information system tailored to agriculture,” he detailed.

Project ADAPT Jamaica is a joint initiative supported by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the Jamaica Social Investment Fund (JSIF) and the DBJ.