Riyadh Mo­hammed

Over the past year, the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress ad­min­is­tra­tion has tak­en some steps to trans­late its 2025 man­i­festo promis­es in­to con­crete ac­tions for the food and agri­cul­ture sec­tor. The Min­istry of Agri­cul­ture and Fish­eries has pri­ori­tised train­ing and ca­pac­i­ty build­ing, launch­ing the Na­tion­al Agri­cul­tur­al Train­ing Ini­tia­tive (NATI) in ear­ly 2026 to train rough­ly 20,000 farm­ers and agri-en­tre­pre­neurs across 35 cours­es, with a strong fo­cus on mod­ern, cli­mate-re­silient tech­niques and agro-pro­cess­ing. This aligns with the man­i­festo’s pledge to mod­ernise farm­ing through pre­ci­sion agri­cul­ture, dig­i­tal tools, and ded­i­cat­ed train­ing cen­tres, and marks one of the most clear­ly rolled-out man­i­fes­ta­tions of the UNC’s agri-mod­erni­sa­tion agen­da.

The Gov­ern­ment has al­so be­gun to in­vest in land-linked and in­cen­tive-based pro­grammes that mir­ror the 2025 promise to un­lock 25,000 acres, ex­pand agri-in­sur­ance, and pro­vide greater sup­port to small farm­ers. Bud­get doc­u­ments for the 2026 fi­nan­cial year show a sub­stan­tial al­lo­ca­tion to agri­cul­ture (ap­prox­i­mate­ly $800 mil­lion) chan­nelled in­to ir­ri­ga­tion, drainage, land de­vel­op­ment, and crops and fish­eries-re­lat­ed de­vel­op­ment projects, in­clud­ing coastal and rur­al in­fra­struc­ture that un­der­pins both food se­cu­ri­ty and cli­mate re­silience. While the full 25,000-acre land re­lease and mul­ti-per­il in­sur­ance schemes re­main works in progress, the min­istry has in­ten­si­fied agro-in­cen­tive ini­tia­tives, some youth-tar­get­ted train­ing as well as agro­nom­ic sup­port, sig­nalling a shift to­ward more struc­tured, medi­um-term sup­port rather than one-off hand­outs.

Fi­nal­ly, the UNC-led ad­min­is­tra­tion has start­ed to build the in­sti­tu­tion­al and pol­i­cy ar­chi­tec­ture im­plied in the 2025 Man­i­festo for food-se­cu­ri­ty led di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion and ex­port-ori­ent­ed agri­cul­ture. The con­tin­ued em­pha­sis on re­duc­ing the food im­port bill, in­creas­ing agri­cul­ture’s share of GDP and push­ing for ex­port-ori­ent­ed niche crops and val­ue-added prod­ucts is re­flect­ed in the de­sign of the Agri­cul­ture for Food Se­cu­ri­ty and fish­eries com­po­nents of the 2026 de­vel­op­ment pro­gramme, as well as part­ner­ships with FAO and oth­er agen­cies to scale up cli­mate-smart and small­hold­er-friend­ly prac­tices. From stake­hold­er per­spec­tives, im­ple­men­ta­tion is still at an ear­ly stage and un­even, but the last year has clear­ly moved the sec­tor from man­i­festo rhetoric to­ward tar­get­ted train­ing, land-re­lat­ed in­vest­ments and a more co­her­ent pol­i­cy nar­ra­tive cen­tred on re­silience, pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, and ex­port po­ten­tial.

Pro­grammes launched with­in the last year

Over the last year, the UNC gov­ern­ment has launched a flag­ship Na­tion­al Agri­cul­tur­al Train­ing Ini­tia­tive (NATI) as a cen­tral pil­lar of its ef­fort to re­vi­talise the food and agri­cul­ture sec­tor. NATI, of­fi­cial­ly in­tro­duced in Feb­ru­ary 2026, of­fers a suite of prac­ti­cal, cli­mate-smart cours­es in crop and live­stock pro­duc­tion, agro-pro­cess­ing and agri-tech­nol­o­gy, tar­get­ting small and medi­um farm­ers, youth, women, and co­op­er­a­tives across all eight coun­ties. This ini­tia­tive di­rect­ly re­sponds to the 2025 Man­i­festo’s call to mod­ernise farm­ing through train­ing, dig­i­tal tools, and val­ue-added skills, and it has al­ready been rolled out to thou­sands of par­tic­i­pants via the min­istry’s Ex­ten­sion and Train­ing Di­vi­sion. The con­cern is that the NATI ini­tia­tive mir­rors the same ef­forts as the ETIS, es­pe­cial­ly when the fa­cil­i­ta­tors are shared.

The “Pi­lot Pro­gramme for Soy­abean, Corn and Black Eyed Pro­duc­tion” is the main new ini­tia­tive in Trinidad. Launched by the Min­istry of Agri­cul­ture and Fish­eries in March 2026, it us­es a phased, small-scale pi­lot to na­tion­al‑scale ap­proach to test best prac­tice sys­tems for these three crops on se­lect­ed plots, start­ing in Ca­roni, be­fore ex­pand­ing na­tion­wide. The ini­tia­tive is framed as a strate­gic move to re­duce Trinidad and To­ba­go’s food im­port bill, es­pe­cial­ly for soy­bean and corn used in an­i­mal feed and black eye beans for hu­man con­sump­tion. It tar­gets small and medi­um-scale farm­ers, sup­ports feed se­cu­ri­ty for poul­try, swine, and dairy, and pro­motes cli­mate-smart prac­tices such as ni­tro­gen-fix­ing legumes, im­proved crop ro­ta­tion, and bet­ter soil man­age­ment.

A third clus­ter of new ini­tia­tives has fo­cussed on in­sti­tu­tion­al strength­en­ing and cli­mate-re­silient pro­gram­ming. Build­ing on World Food Day-linked an­nounce­ments, the gov­ern­ment has deep­ened its part­ner­ship with FAO and oth­er agen­cies to roll out cli­mate-smart agri­cul­ture and re­silience projects, par­tic­u­lar­ly in small­hold­er and coastal zones where sea lev­el rise and rain­fall fluc­tu­a­tions threat­en pro­duc­tiv­i­ty. At the same time, the min­istry has pro­mot­ed school and com­mu­ni­ty-linked agri-ed­u­ca­tion pi­lots, aim­ing to con­nect young peo­ple and ur­ban peri-ur­ban com­mu­ni­ties with small-scale pro­duc­tion and agro pro­cess­ing. To­geth­er, these steps il­lus­trate an at­tempt to move be­yond ad hoc sup­port to­ward a more struc­tured, mul­ti-year agen­da that links train­ing, in­cen­tives, land use, and cli­mate re­silience with­in the broad­er food-se­cu­ri­ty goals set out in the 2025 UNC Man­i­festo.

Is­sues plagu­ing the sec­tor

The food and agri­cul­ture sec­tor in Trinidad and To­ba­go is be­ing held back by chron­ic un­der­in­vest­ment, weak in­fra­struc­ture, and an un­sta­ble pol­i­cy en­vi­ron­ment. The sec­tor has re­ceived some of the small­est bud­get al­lo­ca­tions in re­cent years, which has un­der­mined re­search, ex­ten­sion ser­vices, and ba­sic in­fra­struc­ture such as ir­ri­ga­tion, drainage, and rur­al roads. This lack of con­sis­tent pub­lic sup­port makes it hard for farm­ers to mod­ernise op­er­a­tions, adopt cli­mate-smart tech­nolo­gies, or ex­pand pro­duc­tion, even as the coun­try con­fronts a bal­loon­ing food im­port bill ap­proach­ing TT$7 bil­lion an­nu­al­ly.

An­oth­er ma­jor set of is­sues re­volves around land-rights un­cer­tain­ty, en­vi­ron­men­tal degra­da­tion, and cli­mate vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty. Many small­hold­ers op­er­ate on in­se­cure or in­for­mal­ly held plots, which dis­cour­ages long-term in­vest­ment in in­puts, equip­ment, or soil con­ser­va­tion. At the same time, poor soils, in­ad­e­quate drainage, and re­peat­ed flood­ing or droughts re­duce pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, while sea-lev­el re­lat­ed salt wa­ter in­tru­sion threat­ens coastal farm­land and ground­wa­ter. These stres­sors are com­pound­ed by weak post-har­vest in­fra­struc­ture—lim­it­ed cold-chain stor­age, and pro­cess­ing ca­pac­i­ty—so that even when crops are pro­duced, spoilage and price volatil­i­ty erode farm­ers’ in­comes.

On the hu­man cap­i­tal and mar­ket side, the sec­tor faces an age­ing rur­al work­force, youth ex­o­dus, and frag­ment­ed val­ue chains. Younger peo­ple are of­ten re­luc­tant to en­ter farm­ing due to per­ceived low re­turns, weak so­cial recog­ni­tion, and un­cer­tain re­turns on hard work, even as the gov­ern­ment tries to push youth-agri­cul­ture schemes. At the same time, small farm­ers fre­quent­ly sell through frag­ment­ed mid­dle­men rather than or­gan­ised buy­ers, lim­it­ing their ac­cess to sta­ble prices and ex­port op­por­tu­ni­ties. Broad­er chal­lenges like over­lap­ping food con­trol agen­cies, in­con­sis­tent stan­dards, and heavy de­pen­dence on im­port­ed food and in­puts fur­ther ex­pose the sec­tor to glob­al shocks, leav­ing do­mes­tic agri­cul­ture per­pet­u­al­ly frag­ile and un­der‑re­sourced.

Rec­om­men­da­tions on the way for­ward

To grow the food and agri­cul­ture sec­tor in Trinidad and To­ba­go, the first pri­or­i­ty should be se­cur­ing land and strength­en­ing tenure so that farm­ers can in­vest with con­fi­dence. The Gov­ern­ment should ac­cel­er­ate land ti­tling and put in place long-term leas­es for small­hold­ers and youth farm­ers, while si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly curb­ing prae­di­al lar­ce­ny through bet­ter polic­ing and dig­i­tal farm-reg­is­tra­tion sys­tems. At the same time, pub­lic in­vest­ment should be chan­nelled in­to core in­fra­struc­ture—ir­ri­ga­tion, drainage, rur­al roads, cold stores, and small-scale pro­cess­ing units—so that high­er yields and bet­ter qual­i­ty pro­duce can ac­tu­al­ly reach mar­kets with­out spoilage or ex­ces­sive trans­port costs.

Sec­ond, the sec­tor needs a co­her­ent, mul­ti-year food se­cu­ri­ty and agri­cul­tur­al strat­e­gy that links train­ing, fi­nance, and mar­ket ac­cess in­to a clear path­way for small­hold­ers and agri-en­tre­pre­neurs. The Min­istry of Agri­cul­ture and Fish­eries should ex­pand main­stream pro­grammes like the Na­tion­al Agri­cul­tur­al Train­ing Ini­tia­tive, em­bed­ding cli­mate-smart prac­tices, dig­i­tal tools, and agro-pro­cess­ing skills in­to every course. Fi­nan­cial sup­port should shift from one-off grants to in­come-linked cred­it, ware­house-re­ceipt fi­nanc­ing, and gov­ern­ment-backed in­sur­ance, with spe­cial pack­ages for youth, women, and co­op­er­a­tives, so that cred­it and risk man­age­ment re­in­force each oth­er rather than sim­ply act­ing as short-term sub­si­dies.

Third, pol­i­cy­mak­ers must de­lib­er­ate­ly re­shape val­ue chains to favour lo­cal pro­duc­ers, es­pe­cial­ly in veg­etable, live­stock, and niche ex­port crops. This means build­ing sta­ble in­sti­tu­tion­al-buy­ing arrange­ments—such as school farm con­tracts, Namde­v­co-linked pro­cure­ment, and pub­lic pri­vate ex­port part­ner­ships—so that farm­ers have pre­dictable out­lets at fair prices. At the same time, the gov­ern­ment should sup­port agro­clus­ters and lo­cal pro­cess­ing hubs in key rur­al zones, har­monise food safe­ty and stan­dards en­force­ment, and re­duce bu­reau­crat­ic over­lap among agen­cies.

By com­bin­ing se­cure land, mod­ern in­fra­struc­ture, skills-based sup­port, and stronger mar­ket link­ages, Trinidad and To­ba­go can move from a frag­ile, im­port-de­pen­dent food sys­tem to­ward a more pro­duc­tive, re­silient, and ex­port‑ori­ent­ed agri­cul­tur­al sec­tor.

Riyadh Mo­hammed is the lead agri­cul­ture con­sul­tant at Trop­i­cal Agri­cul­ture Con­sul­tan­cy Ser­vices and can be con­tact­ed at riyadhmo­hammed07@gmail.com