(RealNews)It is disgraceful that moves are being made only now to resuscitate
the Cades Bay Pineapple Farm, says Kelvin “Shugy” Simon, the
United Progressive Party (UPP) candidate for St. Mary’s South.
Mere weeks ago, ploughs were dispatched to the defunct farm,
where they cleared a small area of the station that had been left to
run down over the past five years.
During that time, Simon’s opponent, Samantha Marshall, had
stewardship of the agriculture sector. However, she failed to do
anything meaningful to preserve the renowned Antigua Black,
branded the world’s sweetest pineapple, critics say.
Last Thursday, July 27, Marshall bowed out of the upcoming by-
election in that constituency. But Simon says it is disgraceful that
the Browne Administration had deployed that type of tactic to get its
candidate elected.
He harks back to the days of the UPP Government when the
pineapple farm was thriving under the leadership of former
Agriculture Minister Hilson “Brother B” Baptiste.
Meanwhile, Simon says it was rumoured that, while the front
portion of the farm was neglected, work was being done at the back.
But, he says, that is a lie. No farm work at all was taking place at the
Cades Bay Station and the back of the farm is worse than the front.
If the Browne Administration had cared about the production and
development of the pineapple farm, at all, Simon says, then it would
not have been left to fall into dis-use and the work started by
Baptiste would have been continued.
