Minister of Industry Donville Inniss says his ministry did nothing wrong in sanctioning the controversial importation of two containers of chicken wings by a local restaurant.
His comments came in response to protests from the Barbados Agricultural Society (BAS) chief executive officer James Paul to the move, and a full page ad yesterday from the Barbados Agricultural Development & Marketing Corporation (BADMC) seeking to clarify the situation.
The ad said the BADMC were awaiting the findings of a University of the West Indies study due by month end to determine the impact of poultry importation on local poultry industry sales. In the interim, they have asked the restaurant granted the licence not to import anymore wings until advised to do so by them.
Yesterday, Inniss said “there is a mechanism [governing such imports] that has been in place for a little while now. That’s the one that my ministry followed, where there is a limit of 140 000 kilograms of poultry products that can be imported into Barbados on a monthly basis,” he told reporters during a tour of BMEX yesterday.
He added that reports from his office and other agencies indicated that the BADMC or the state had not exceeded or come close to that figure. (TY)
