Crop spraying goes state-of-the-art

AN agricultural worker was spotted yesterday spraying tomatoes yesterday on leased land at Fisherpond Plantation in St Joseph.
The act of spraying was not what caught the eye of the DAILY NATION team however but what was doing the spraying.
The man, who asked to remain anonymous, said it was an electrostatic spray system which he said used compressed air and electricity to spray the underside of the leaves.
He said it was unique to Barbados and quite expensive, although he did not disclose the price.
As for the pesticide, he said it was a mixture of kuposhan, manzate and orthene designed to kill bugs which would otherwise destroy the crop. He said it was not harmful to humans and it did not even harm the birds which he said followed him on a daily basis eating the insects exposed by the work.
He said the real problem was weed killer which was used on the nearby sugar cane field and which sometimes got on the tomato plants and caused them to shrivel. (CA)