The Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries is on a drive to put unused lands into food production. Recently, 9,000 acres were transferred from the National Land Agency (NLA), and are now being allocated for farming. Portfolio Minister, Hon. Floyd Green, has said that personnel from the Ministry and the Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA) are going across the island “organising...

Without the $500,000 grant from M & M Jamaica Limited, Gavieal Gordon, a third-year medical student at the University of the West Indies (UWI), would not have been able to meet her financial obligations to the university and faced the possibility of being deregistered. Ms. Gordon, who hails from the community of Woodford in East Rural St. Andrew, had made...

The five-year sports development plan at Maggotty High School, in St. Elizabeth,  has been reaping success after the institution placed 10th nationally, following the recent 2021 ISSA/GraceKennedy Boys and Girls' Athletics Championship. This is the highest level the school has achieved after years of competing in the annual sporting competition. Now, all eyes are on the 50-year-old institution whose motto is: ‘Striving...

The New Social Housing Programme (NSHP), initiated in 2018 by Prime Minister, the Most Hon. Andrew Holness, is enabling poor and indigent persons to own their own home. Being implemented under the Housing, Opportunity, Production and Employment Programme (HOPE), with oversight by the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation, the initiative aims to improve the housing condition of the...

Young people are being encouraged to enter the profession of seafaring, as the world pays keener attention to the essential service provided by seamen and seafaring women during the COVID-19 pandemic. Dean of the Faculty of Marine and Nautical Studies at the Caribbean Maritime University (CMU), Captain Devron Newman, explains to JIS News, the process of  how seafarers are produced...

More than 700,000 Jamaicans in the parishes of St. Elizabeth, Manchester and Clarendon are to benefit from improved access to healthcare through the donation of $32 million by the Culture, Health, Arts, Sports and Education (CHASE) Fund for the acquisition of surgical equipment for health facilities in the Southern Regional Health Authority (SRHA). The equipment, including surgical beds and tables,...

Jamaican Scientist, Dr. Camir Ricketts, wants to widen the access to mentorship for students across Jamaica. He intends to do this through his programme, ‘Minds of Jamaica’, where students can have access to professionals from several industries. These mentors are what he calls, ‘the Minds’. Dr. Ricketts says mentorship should not only be used as a behavioural intervention tool for...

For most 17-year-olds, the approach of summer 2021 represents a time when their sole focus is on preparing for final and exit examinations, all while looking forward to a much needed break from online learning and face-to-face instruction. However, for one teen, The Queen’s School student, Kyla Gaynor, responding to the requests of her peers in fulfilling extracurricular obligations while...

When Kimesha Francis stepped forward to say thanks publicly for a new house she received from the Government, today (June 29), under the New Social Housing Programme (NSHP), she was overcome with tears of joy. She had to be soothed by her mother, Sandra Walters, after walking up to give the Vote of Thanks at the handover ceremony held at...