Ministry of Agriculture Officers paid a visit to Island Academy

Tuesday 6th February, 2024, the officers visited the school after receiving a request from Mrs. Lilly Williams, the grade six teacher at the Island Academy.   She expressed that assistance was needed to explain three questions and felt that having experts explain to her students would be a better option rather than disseminating the information herself.

The Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) staff in attendance were amongst those trained in 2023 by the FAO and Global Soil Partner in the “Soil Doctors Programme”.  These MOA’s employees were Miss Anika Aska, Mr. Victor Wade (Agricultural officers) attached to the Agricultural Extension Division, Ms Carol-Faye Bynoe-George (Communication Officer), and they were accompanied by Miss Shenequa Williams, Assistant of the MOA Communication Unit.  The session was a very interactive one and the twenty-four students beamed with questions.

The presentations were pertaining to both social studies and science:

  • Question 1. Explain how soil types have impacted on the type of industries found in specific areas of Antigua and Barbuda.

 

This was presented by Ms Bynoe-George.  Her explained to the students the tree main types of soil found which were limestone in the north, clay in the middle belt and volcanic in the south.  Additionally, several industries were identified, however, Hotel/Tourism and Agriculture/Fisheries got most of the emphasis.

  • Question 2. State the different kinds of crops in Antiguan and Barbudan agriculture (e.g. principal food crops, export cash crops).

This was presented by Mr. Wade, who named some principal food crops to include sweet potatoes and the many varieties, pumpkins and vegetables.  Additionally, he described the different types of crops and gave a few examples of produce exported on a small scale, such as pumpkin.

  • Name and discuss the factors influencing food production in Antigua and Barbuda.

This was presented by Miss Aska. In her presentation she mentioned factors such as favourable weather conditions, quality soil structure and proper farm management were some of on the list she outlined in regards to some of the requirements for food production. Additionally, Miss Aska also demonstrated what were some of unfavourables such as lack of water and availability of proper farm implements.

Following the three power point presentations, the officers did two of the seven soil experiments from the FAO Soil Doctor training they received in 2023.  The tests were soil PH  and carbon/organic matter of four soil types collected from the east, south, central sections of the island and the fourth was collected on the school premises. The students were very interested in the reactions they noticed from these tests but was a little sadden that the clayish soil obtained from the school compound had the less responsive.