The Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Mining is advancing Jamaica’s meals safety and pioneering a brand new frontier in blue financial system sustainability by means of a Purple Snapper Cage Tradition Fin Fish Pilot Mission.
The mission is spearheaded by the United Nations Meals and Agriculture Group (FAO), in partnership with the Nationwide Fisheries Authority (NFA).
The initiative kinds a part of a regional Shrimp and Purple Snapper Pilot Develop-Out underneath the Caribbean Neighborhood (CARICOM), applied in Jamaica, St. Lucia, and St. Kitts and Nevis by the FAO at a value of roughly $63 million.
Regionally, the Purple Snapper Pilot Mission is being undertaken on the NFA’s Bowden Bay Mariculture Analysis Facility in St. Thomas.
NFA Chief Govt Officer (CEO), Dr. Gavin Bellamy, mentioned the initiative aligns with the Agriculture Ministry’s ‘FACE of Meals’ programme, which focuses on meals safety, agribusiness improvement, climate-smart applied sciences, and export growth.
“It aligns with the general imaginative and prescient for the fishery sector. To begin with, Jamaica is transferring and desires to attain meals independence—that’s the principal factor. Fish is a really wholesome protein. So, we are attempting our greatest to extend our marine inventory… our tilapia, our captured fisheries, all our fish inventory to have it accessible to the nation at an inexpensive worth,” he informed JIS Information.
Dr. Bellamy was talking throughout a tour of the analysis facility on Monday (October 13) to showcase the event progress of the pilot mission.
The CEO additionally underscored the initiative’s environmental advantages, noting its potential to help the restoration of reef fisheries and to create ecological area for the return of different marine species.
The FAO’s June 2025 world evaluation of marine fish shares revealed that 64.5 per cent of fisheries are inside sustainable limits, whereas 35.5 per cent are actually overfished – underscoring the urgency and relevance of initiatives such because the Purple Snapper Cage Tradition Pilot Mission
“This helps us to cut back the stress initially on our reef fisheries, permitting our reef fisheries to rejuvenate, to extend sustainability for reintroduction of sure species. If we do that accurately, we are able to do import substitution and go into export,” Dr. Bellamy famous.
He disclosed that Jamaica at the moment imports roughly 80 per cent of the fishery merchandise consumed nationally, including that the nation ranks among the many highest customers globally.
In the meantime, Assistant FAO Consultant for Jamaica, The Bahamas and Belize, Roslyn Jackson-Richards, highlighted the significance of collaboration for the mission’s long-term success.
“Public-Non-public Partnership is essential on this initiative whereby we’re looking for to scale up the finfish and crustacean within the Caribbean, which is a broader initiative geared in the direction of improved livelihoods and guaranteeing that we’ve a sustainable blue financial system,” she mentioned.
Mrs. Jackson-Richards reaffirmed the FAO’s dedication to ongoing collaboration with the Ministry, emphasising the organisation’s help for exploring the initiative’s future growth.
“This mission is past manufacturing. It’s anticipated that the initiative will enhance the livelihoods of coastal communities and develop the aquaculture sector in Jamaica,” the FAO Consultant mentioned.
Dr. Bellamy reported that the Purple Snapper Cage Tradition Pilot Mission is over 70 per cent full.
The upcoming part will contain transferring fingerlings into anchored sea cages, the place they are going to bear the grow-out cycle underneath shut monitoring of development charges, survival outcomes, and environmental efficiency indicators.
Dr. Bellamy added that documentation of the pilot mission’s processes, related prices, and rising finest practices is ongoing, and this data might be shared with CARICOM companions upon the initiative’s conclusion in 2026.
