Positive Development - Making Something Creative From Nothing

Making something from nothing is a Jamaican specialty - from The Gleaner -

Peter Watson weaving wicker for 25 years

 
Published:Saturday | June 30, 2012

Nackeshia Tomlinson, Gleaner Writer

QUICKSTEP, St Elizabeth:

PETER WATSON has been making furniture from wicker for more than 25 years - and he would have it no other way. "The greatest thing about it a when you finish something and people feel excited 'bout it," said Watson.

According to Watson, wicker is the term given to a twig, cane, reed, or vine that is woven or braided to make furniture. He is adept at this skill and can make up to 20 small pieces in a week. He has made baskets, chairs, bookcases, magazine racks, frames, and a map of Jamaica from wicker.
Although Watson is also proficient in cabinetmaking, he is widely known for his speciality: making products from wicker. He was introduced to the skill after he completed school.
"When mi did younger and people know mi a go school a evening time, mi used to go to a workshop and watch some other man work."
Watson said this led him to pursue a two-year apprenticeship stint in Manchester, where he learnt more about making furniture, which included making furniture from wicker.
After his apprenticeship, he worked elsewhere for a number of years, then he returned to Quickstep, which has been his base ever since. In the community, he has helped to facilitate employment for other people who supply him with the raw material.
"Mi have people who mi used to buy the wicker from," explained Watson.
He demonstrated part of the preparation process, which involved harvesting a section of the vine from the vast forest across from his house. Carefully catalogued, original, or modified designs help Watson whenever he is making a wicker item.

MAKING THE FURNITURE

The remaining procedure requires that he source the dried wicker. He separates it and puts it into water so it can become flexible for braiding and weaving. He then torches the product with special equipment to keep the weaving in place, then varnishes it. After the process has been completed, minor upkeep is required because wicker items are durable and can last for many years.
Wicker-making has allowed Watson to travel extensively on the north coast.
"Me know a lot of place - and people always want you to build things - like in Ocho Rios, Negril, and Montego Bay."
This is because "people always come for mi fi work, and mi stay all two months", related Watson.
He also had the opportunity to supply a Kingston-based store that specialises in locally made products. Unfortunately, the store has closed, and except for items that are pre-ordered, Watson does not have a steady market.
Watson believes one thing that has contributed to the low demand is the varied choice of furniture on the market. He revealed that over the years, he has harboured thoughts of having a store in Santa Cruz, where he could display his products; however, he has been constrained by the required capital.
rural@gleanerjm.com 

http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20120630/lead/lead4.html

Legal Ganga In JA - sort of

  Cracks in the machine. Not complaining but two ounces is not enough.

Jamaica poised to relax cannabis laws 

Several restrictions on ‘ganja’ use could go up in smoke as island’s politicians back bill to establish licensing authority

The Jamaican cabinet has approved a bill that would decriminalise possession of small amounts of cannabis and pave the way for a legal medical marijuana industry, the justice minister has said.
Mark Golding said he expected to introduce the legislation in the Senate this week. Debate could start this month in the country where the drug, known popularly as “ganja”, has long been culturally entrenched but illegal.
The bill would establish a cannabis licensing authority to deal with the regulations needed to cultivate, sell and distribute the herb for medical, scientific and therapeutic purposes. “We need to position ourselves to take advantage of the significant economic opportunities offered by this emerging industry,” he said.
It would make possession of 2 ounces (56g) or less an offence that would not result in a criminal record. Cultivation of five or fewer plants on any premises would be permitted. Rastafarians, who use marijuana as a sacrament, could also legally use it for religious purposes for the first time in Jamaica, where the spiritual movement was founded in the 1930s.
For decades, debate has raged on the Caribbean island over laws governing marijuana use. But now, with several countries and US states relaxing their laws on the herb, Jamaica is advancing reform plans.
Golding said the government would not soften its stance on drug trafficking and it intended to use a proportion of revenues from its licensing authority to support a public education campaign to discourage pot-smoking by young people and mitigate public health consequences.
The director of the national Cannabis Commercial and Medicinal Research Taskforce said he expected the bill to be passed soon in parliament, where Portia Simpson Miller’s governing party holds a 2-1 majority. “This development is long overdue,” Delano Seiveright said.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/22/jamaica-considers-cannabis-legalisation






A cannabis farmer in Nine Mile, Jamaica. Photograph: David Mcfadden/AP

Waterfalls!

Waterfalls!

St Thomas' best kept secret

Locals earn from little known ‘Reggae Falls

BY INGRID BROWN Associate editor — special assignment browni@jamaicaobserver.com

Monday, March 03, 2014

WATERFALLS cascading several feet to the Johnson River in Hillside, St Thomas not only serve as a relaxing place for visitors wanting to spend an enjoyable day with nature, but also provide an income to the many unemployed residents in this farming district.

They have eked out a living working as tour guides, car washers, babysitters and cooks for the many locals and foreigners alike who are known to visit the area, which is being described as St Thomas' best kept secret.

The residents claim the water, which spouts warm from a section of the rock, contains sulphur and assists in healing wounds.

"If you have a wound and you go in the water you frighten fi see how quick it heal," explained resident Deborah Whyte.

Although they have been earning, albeit in an ad hoc manner, the residents are calling on tourism organisations to help them secure formal training as official tour guides and to help them improve Reggae Falls — as they have since dubbed it – by putting in sanitray and other conveniences. They also want the Jamaica Tourist Board to promote the facility locally and overseas, to attract more visitors.

According to the residents, visitors prefer to come to Reggae Falls instead of Bath Fountain because it is much more quiet and there is less harassment.

Whyte, who often works as tour guide, car washer and even babysitter said the facility has the potential to provide a steady income.

"When the visitors them come, if wi have some lime or a plantain or some jelly wi carry it come down here. We might see a crowd and wi tell them we have some lime and them say go pick it and carry come and just like that we mek a sale," she said.

According to Whyte, who escorted the Jamaica Observer North East on a treacherous track to a shallow area in the river which allowed for easy crossing to the nearby falls, the visitors are the ones who often request the residents' assistance as tour guides.

"Sometimes them will come from all over Jamaica and overseas, and will ask us to direct them to the falls and we would take them over to there," she said.

"Because we know the area, we know when it raining in the head of the river and we tell them so they can know where to go," she said.

Whyte further explained that when the river is dry some people will drive their SUVs through the river bed to the closest point to the falls. When this happens, the residents might not earn from guiding tours, but they will from cooking and selling food along the river.

The mother of two said only recently a large group of police officers visited the area, which provided a decent earning for people who were willing to wash cars.

"Mi mek $13,000 that day washing cars," she said, adding: "Sometimes I even earn money by babysitting the children while the parents go up to the falls".

Joan Harris said the summer is the busiest period for the residents as this is when the largest number of persons visit.

"People feel safe to come here because the residents look out for them and they know they are going to come back and see their vehicle the same way dem leave it," she said.

"On a holiday, you don't have space up there and not even Dunn's River can test that time, because people come from as far as Westmoreland," she added.

Residents also earn by allowing visitors to park in their yards for $100, or from vending the produce they farm.

"Sometimes when you see the high-end vehicles that come up here and even more people would come if they knew about it because of how lovely the falls is and also because the community is safe," said Harris.

Font Hill resident Daneisha Wright, who was visiting the falls at the time the Observer North East was there, said this was one of her favourite spot in the parish.

"I always come here as often as I can because it is a lovely place," she said before diving off a huge rock into the river below.

http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/St-Thomas--best-kept-secret_16172474

Can Jamaica Increase Coffee Production?

  Coffee production in Jamaica from an article in The Gleaner -

Is Jamaica on a coffee break? Local farmers among lowest producers in region, says CIB

Published: Monday | September 29, 2014
Marie Hill, Gleaner Writer
WITH THE price per box of Blue Mountain Coffee averaging $5,000, the coffee-farming sector is missing out on a bonanza in the region of $2.5 billion annually, which would be possible if production reaches the 500,000 boxes targeted by the Coffee Industry Board (CIB) and the Jamaica Agricultural Society.
Currently, earnings in the sector are less than half this target amount as coffee production has fallen to less than 200,000 boxes annually.
Local coffee production, which has fallen from a high of more than 500,000 boxes in 2004 to under 200,000 boxes for the last crop year, continues to compare unfavourably with other producers in Central America and the Caribbean, Gusland McCook, manager of the Advisory Services Unit with the CIB, states.
While average production in Jamaica ranges from eight boxes per acre to 37 boxes for larger farms, in Mexico, average production is higher, ranging from 16 boxes per acre in the Oaxaca region to 52 boxes in Vera Cruz. One box of cherry coffee converts to 9.5 pounds of green beans.
Jamaican production is also much lower than Colombia, where production averages 57 boxes per acre, and Costa Rica, where the average is 97 boxes.
MAKE USE OF TECHNOLOGY
McCook is suggesting that local farmers make use of technology to improve yield, noting that the most productive in Jamaica are a "very small" group who make use of technology in farming and now average production of 82 boxes of coffee per acre.
McCook was speaking during 'Coffee - Challenges in Production and Export', staged by the Caribbean Academy of Sciences, Jamaica, in collaboration with the Pesticide Research Laboratory and the CIB at the University of the West Indies, Mona, recently.
CIB data indicate that among more than 10,000 farmers, most of whom are registered with the CIB, the average small holder farms coffee on five acres and produces on an average eight boxes per acre.
In between these two extremes are farmers who produce inconsistently and who are described by the board as "opportunists". Their production level is higher, at an average 20 boxes per acre.
At the high end of production are regular large coffee farmers, producing on farms of average size 13 acres with output of 37 boxes per acre. At the most productive end - 82 boxes per acre, farm size averages 107 acres and gross annual income is approximately $24 million.
Coffee producers in Jamaica are spread from the Blue Mountains region in St Andrew, Portland, and St Thomas to the highlands of western Jamaica.
The island is segmented into four regions by the coffee board, with the largest region being Blue Mountains farming country, which has 2,856 registered farmers and just over 6,000 acres under cultivation.
Producers in the island's northern region - east and western St Ann, Guy's Hill, and north-west and central St Catherine - include 577 registered farmers, with 682 acres under cultivation.
In the central region - South Trelawny, St Elizabeth, north and south Manchester, Frankfield and south and eastern Clarendon - the board notes 566 registered farmers, with 460 acres being actively cultivated.
In western Jamaica - inclusive of production areas in Catadupa and Darliston - there are 103 registered farmers, with 80.53 acres under cultivation.
editor@gleanerjm.com
From the comments -

Anjahli Parnell • 2 months ago

A box of coffee cherry is 60 pounds, so that is a price of about 83.35 JA$ per pound, which would equal about 75 cents in US$. Kona coffee, which is comparable to Jamaican Blue Mountain, is bought from farmers at $1.75 per pound of coffee cherry. Who is fooling who? How can the farmers in Jamaica be motivated to grow coffee at this price?

http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20140929/lead/lead2.html