Sugar Cane Farmers to Access Financing for Replanting Program

Farmers from the Progressive Sugar Cane Producers Association (PSCPA) will have greater access to financing for agricultural inputs and machinery through a new memorandum of understanding signed with the Development Finance Corporation (DFC). The parties signed the MOU yesterday and committed to work together in support of the Sugar Cane Replanting Program. R. Lee Vicente, Marketing and Communications Manager for the DFC says that the MOU forms a part of activities aimed at accessing the Green Climate Fund. Vicente says that projects under the MOU will address the national goal of combatting the effects of climate change.

R. Lee Vicente, Marketing and Communications Manager, DFC: “In that regard the DFC signed a memorandum of understanding with the Cane Farmers Producers Association in working towards their support to the sugar cane replanting program. Working with them helps to aid in our mission to support industries throughout the entire country. This MOU seeks for us to foster cooperation between the DFC and the BSCPA as it relates to the sugar cane replanting we intend to foster various activities crucial to the cultivation of sugar cane, planting, maintaining obtaining seeds for the cane and purchasing agrochemicals and fertilizers. Of course this all goes again to climate change and the mitigation of climate change. Climate change is a focus of the DFC, it’s a focus of the country and the two together work hand in hand because DFC being a development bank focuses on what the goals of the country is. So being focused on climate change the funds available to us will allow us to work in areas that allows the country to focus on green financing and green financing in the space of ensuring that we have longevity over time. So when we focus on funds for green climate we’re thinking about thirty years from now, fifty years from now because we will be able to ensure that all projects coming through that is ensuring that we focus on green climate.”

At the signing ceremony, Henry N. Anderson, CEO of the DFC also said that the partnership will benefit farmers and communities by enhancing productivity, sustainability, and resilience within the sugar industry.