Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Senator Haynesley Benn would like to see Barbadians and tourists eat more local Black Belly lamb rather than imported lamb.

However, he admitted that the relatively high price of local lamb compared to imported was often used as a prohibitive factor.

"We have to look at developing our local lamb industry. We have a very good product here and it has been noted in the past few years for its prolificacy. Studies have indicated that the meat is of a very high quality and I believe that there is the potential for expansion through breeding."

With regard to the cost, Benn said that local lamb was a very high-quality meat with low-fat content, so more Barbadians should be encouraged by the menus of restaurants and hotels to eat it.

"Quite naturally imported lamb will be much cheaper – our cost of production would be higher. But, if we can find ways of feeding our animals, our sheep in particular, using indigenous materials and having them properly managed, it would assist in cost reduction," he added.

Expand process

Noting that the Ministry of Agriculture was playing its part in rearing high-quality animals at Greenland Livestock Station and also providing lambs to local farmers and the wider community, the senator it said wanted to expand the process to include feed lots.

"We want to go a step further, to see that there are well-managed feed lots set up – so that local farmers can take their lambs to the feed lot, and have them reared under good feeding and management practices. The animals can then be properly slaughtered and taken to supermarkets, hotels and restaurants. I believe that if we are going to do it very well – we need to establish and have properly run feed lots," he observed.

(BGIS)