One-Day Denbigh Show to Demonstrate Resilience in Agriculture

The one-day staging of this year’s Denbigh Agricultural, Industrial and Food show will showcase the resilience of the country’s farmers as they recover and rebuild in the aftermath of Hurricane Beryl, says Jamaica Agricultural Society (JAS) President, Lenworth Fulton.

The show, now billed for August 6 (Independence Day), has been scaled down from the original three-day format, due to the disruption of the agricultural sector caused by the July 3 Category four hurricane.

Speaking in an interview with JIS News on Monday (July 29), Mr. Fulton said that “the one-day show is really to demonstrate resilience to climate change and to hurricanes”.

He said that three seminars are being planned to “to teach farmers how to build back better and how to be more resilient for future hurricanes and bad weather”.

The seminars will also be used to impart the way forward and to get input suppliers and other entities to make benefits available to the affected farmers, Mr. Fulton said.

He noted that the show will also provide some “jollification” for the farmers as they recover from the hurricane’s devastating impact.

“They [farmers] need a day of social integration and networking after such a disaster. Farmers are like everybody else – they go through their period of depression, and they need a little jollification,” Mr. Fulton said.

Despite the shortened form of the show, patrons will still have a lot to look forward to, such as competitions, displays, vendors, culinary delights, farm queen competition, children and family entertainment package and an official show.

“What we have done is to take the template for the one-day shows – St. Mary, Hague, Montpelier – and use that template. Those [shows] have most of the features that you would find at Denbigh but in a far more limited way,” Mr. Fulton pointed out.

This year marks the 70th anniversary of the Denbigh show, and the JAS is heightening preparations for patrons to spend Independence Day at the storied event with their entire families.

“It’s a public holiday, and I am encouraging [patrons and farmers] to come. Those who can come, come,” President Fulton said.

The show will be held at its usual home – the Denbigh Showground in May Pen, Clarendon.

Gates open at 8:00 a.m., and admission is $1,500 for adults and $600 for children.