250 acres of millets to be cultivated at Tacama mega farm

Millets acquired through a partnership with India will be produced at Tacama Landing along the Berbice River as the country strives to achieve its ambitious food security goal.

Agriculture Minister, Zulfikar Mustapha on Monday told reporters at the sidelines of an event that the four packs of millets gifted in August will cover 250 acres of land at the mega farm.

“We will start the millet cultivation soon, as a matter of fact, this crop coming, Tacama Gold that we partnered with to do corn and soya, they will start about 250 acres of millet production over there at the Tacama intermediate Savannah,” Minister Zulfikar said.

Millets are a group of cereal grains that are widely consumed in developing countries.

“We will start shortly with this new crop of corn, soya and millet and other things very shortly, they are now preparing the land and that should start in a month from now,” he said.

The millets were gifted to Minister Mustapha on behalf of the Government of India as part of final the commitment delivered by the former Indian High Commissioner Dr KJ Srinivasa.

This initiative was orchestrated during a meeting between President Dr Irfaan Ali and the Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi at the Global Millet Conference in March.

The Guyana government has invested in the farmlands with access roads and a $786 million storage facility was bought for the work conducted at Tacama Landing.

Additionally, the land there is fertile and the crop can withstand the tropical climate. This cereal grain is usually grounded into flour. Considering the global impacts of the Ukraine/Russia war, this will greatly benefit the economy.