Farmers Encouraged to Improve Disaster Management Practices

The Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA) is encouraging farmers to improve their disaster management practices, in light of recent earthquake activity jolting Jamaica.

RADA Livestock Specialist, Maxine Brown, says general disaster management practices can be used to reduce damage caused by earthquakes, hurricanes, heavy rains and flooding.

“After a natural hazard, farmers should make sure that they… and their families are safe. You want to make sure that the water supply for your animals is not contaminated in any way, and to check the facility where animals are kept,” she said.

Ms. Brown told JIS News that should animals get injured during natural hazards such as an earthquake, medical attention should be provided immediately.

“Farmers should also check if anything fell on their animals. If it’s something bigger than what you can manage, contact your nearest veterinarian. As a farmer, you should have these vet numbers on hand, so it shouldn’t be too difficult for you to find a vet,” she said.

As part of best practice, farmers should also have a first-aid kit for themselves, should they sustain injury on the farm, as well as one for their animals to treat minor wounds.

Farmers are also reminded to construct sturdy facilities to house and shelter their livestock.

Ms. Brown said coops, stables, barns and sheds should be able to withstand certain shocks.

“We tend to do different types of structural construction using probably just zinc and lumber, and sometimes it’s not as strong. If it’s not strong enough to withstand it, you just must check it to make sure that it is still sturdy, it won’t collapse on the animal anytime soon or, if it has collapsed, to still see what you can do,” she said.

Should the security features of an animal’s pen or housing area fail during a natural hazard, ensuring that livestock are properly tagged can help with their retrieval.

“We always tell persons to tag your animals because if it is that you had the earthquake and it frightened the animal and maybe the pen or gate that you had, loosened and the animal ran out, then it’s easier to find the animals if they’re tagged, because anybody seeing the animal with a particular tag can know that it is your animal,” Ms. Brown explained.

Farmers are also reminded to ensure that where they have stored their feed is safe from potential water damage, resulting broken pipes or spilled contaminants.

“Animals are very resilient. But you just want to make sure that no physical harm comes to them and the structure is still there to provide adequate protection for them, because there’s very little sometimes we can do to protect [them] from an earthquake itself,” the livestock specialist added.