By Nancy Baker | Communications Director
INMED Caribbean is excited to partner with Jamaica 4-H Clubs to implement the INMED Aquaponics® Social Enterprise (INMED ASE) in Jamaica. It is the first INMED ASE to be launched beyond South Africa, where it has been scaling throughout the country.
The INMED ASE is an expansion of the Increasing Access to Climate-smart Agriculture (IACA) program that INMED Caribbean has been facilitating over the past four years in Jamaica. Like the IACA program, the INMED ASE will continue to provide technical and business training, access to affordable financing and links to markets to help smallholder farmers increase their capacity and incubate entrepreneurial agro-enterprises. The INMED ASE will be operated out of a hub farm, which will operate commercial aquaponics systems for training and producing crops for sale and will serve as a consolidation center for smallholder farmers to sell their harvests at much higher rates than they would get on their own. The farm will also offer significantly discounted inputs, such as seedlings, fingerlings and fish food as well as consulting services. The revenue generated from the INMED ASE business lines will make the enterprise self-sustaining and will provide funding for the programs.
The INMED ASE hub farm is located on a 14-acre parcel of land owned by 4-H in Clarendon, where INMED Caribbean implemented commercial aquaponics systems in five communities hit hard by severe climate change events in 2020. "Like aquaponics, our partnership with Jamaica 4-H Clubs is a symbiotic relationship," said Sherica Campbell, Program Manager of INMED Caribbean. "The 4-H mission to cultivate youth in agriculture perfectly aligns with INMED's goal of providing training and adaptive agriculture skills development for vulnerable youth to achieve well-being and self-reliance." The partnership will also help INMED Caribbean increase its support of the farmers in Clarendon.
INMED Caribbean also implemented its first starter aquaponics system at a 4-H Club facility in urban Kingston to serve as a model and teaching tool for training youth in climate-change awareness, adaptation, sustainable food production, entrepreneurship and agricultural innovation. Jamaica's Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, Pearnel Charles, Jr., recently visited the site for a demonstration and expressed his support for the initiative.
"This starter system is well placed to serve inner-city youth, while demonstrating how aquaponics is ideal for urban agriculture," says Campbell. A launch event for the INMED ASE in Jamaica will be held in May.
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