ROBIN MORAIS Monday, April 10 2006

THE rocky ground at the far end of the Russell Latapy Secondary School may not appear to be suitable for agriculture. However, several of the school’s students and their agricultural science teacher Charles Matthews have turned it into a productive patch of farmland.

Recently, the school harvested and sold a batch of lettuce, hot peppers and pat choi to some of the teachers and students in the school. The young student farmers also took home some of the vegetable crops which they laboured hard to produce.

“Here was originally a piece of dry land but now it’s taking shape with our crops,” said Matthews.

“We started this agricultural project in the school last term on half a lot of land, so by next term, this ground will be a beautiful place to behold. And, with the agricultural students diligently working the land, they’re now seeing that there’s a potentially profitable future for them in agriculture by growing their own crops with their hands.”

Matthews who has experience in farming, is qualified in agricultural sciences and has done several agricultural courses at Centeno.

So far, according to Matthews, praedial larceny is not a problem for the school’s farming project because the security guards are a deterrent for thieves.

The students also grow melongene, ochroes, tomatoes, chive and Spanish thyme. They’re also building agricultural grow boxes for planting some of their crops and are learning about soil composition, grow box production and reaping techniques.

“The students would be able to plant their own crops when they go to their homes thus saving their parents from having to spend money buying the basic food commodities from the market,” stressed Matthews.

“And when they become adults and they have more farming ideas for their agricultural businesses, they’d be able to specialise on a larger scale,” the teacher said.

Insects were becoming a problem for the crops planted by the young farmers but Matthews said they dealt with the bugs by way of pesticides and insecticides.

“We planted a whole bed of lettuce but bachacs came across from the river and ate out all of the lettuce,” he said, “so we then realised we had to use pesticides. We planted a fresh batch of crops, applied pesticides which killed the bachacs, and allowed us to reap our crops without any more bachac problems.”

However, Matthews stressed upon his students to practise proper chemical safety whenever they used insecticides and pesticides because of the potential health risks to them.

“The students use boots, gloves and a face mask while they spray the crop beds, so that they wouldn’t be affected by the chemicals. They have to properly measure the chemicals with a watering can and a container. I also teach them not to immediately reap the crops when they apply the chemicals because it’s dangerous to their health,” Matthew said.

He advised the students to wait for approximately ten days before reaping their crops, again for safety reasons.

“We are not yet ready to introduce natural insect predators to kill the pests that are coming in, so right now we’re using insecticides and pesticides. When we have the garden properly enclosed and the area is developing as an agricultural space, we’ll then try to introduce some insects to control the other insects that are coming to attack the crops,” explain Matthews

He said the students recently sprayed fungicide against a fungus that was attacking the ochroes.

“Since then, we’ve noticed that the fungus has disappeared, the ochroes have picked up and all of the trees are bearing now,” he said.

For fertilisers, Matthews and the students use potash, blue corn and other nutrients to increase the crop yield and to stimulate healthy growth.

Although the school’s agricultural programme is in its infancy, it’s generating a lot of interest among the other students at the Russell Latapy school.

“Right now, the whole project is in its initial stages but there’s a noticeable interest developing among the schoolchildren from the other classes who come running to the agricultural area to be taught something in farming because they’re seeing that the student farmers are benefitting from agriculture.”

He said his class is hoping to produce 100 head of lettuce from their agricultural space in the near future. Some of the school’s male students, he noted, recently planted coconut, table mango and lime trees thus illustrating the positive effect that the school’s farming programme is having on the student body.

“We want to introduce the 4H Club into the school, so we’re looking at rearing some chickens and rabbits on the school compound so we need to look at making some rabbit hutches and chicken pens for the animals,” Matthews said.

The young students of the Russell Latapy Secondary School are not only blazing a trail for farming in their school but also in their community.