Barbados risks losing out on international trade opportunities unless it rapidly upgrades its testing and certification systems to meet global sanitary and phytosanitary standards, the head of Export Barbados has warned.
During Wednesday’s Estimates on the Ministry of Industry, chief executive officer Mark Hill told the House of Assembly strengthening the island’s sanitary and phytosanitary testing capacity was critical if local producers were to meet the standards required in global trade.
He said: “In terms of the sanitary and phytosanitary standards and impacts on trade, what we find is happening is that the labs that we need to put in place, we need to accelerate the development of those particular labs.”
Without upgraded laboratories and certification systems, Barbados risks limiting its ability to export fresh vegetables, meats and other agricultural products, he warned.
“The impact on trade around exporting fresh vegetables and fresh food, and meats as well, we really need to upgrade in that particular area,” Hill added.
The BIDC executive noted that discussions were already under way with the Ministry of Agriculture to close the gap between existing local capabilities and international requirements.
“So we’re hoping to close the gap in discussion with the Ministry of Agriculture, so that that can really lend itself to a greater uptake,” he said.
Hill pointed out that some produce can more easily meet global certification requirements because of their natural protective skins.
“For example, there’s some produce that can get past the GlobalGAP certification needs around sanitary and phytosanitary. So crops like grapefruits and passion fruits that are pretty much packaged in their own skin.”
But other crops, particularly those that are consumed directly without protective coverings, face much stricter standards.
“But any other crop like leafy vegetables and stuff that have direct consumption, the sanitary and phytosanitary impact is significant,” Hill said.
He also underscored missed opportunities in the tourism industry, noting that Barbados currently cannot export certain locally produced foods to cruise ships because of the same regulatory gaps.
“Also like cruise ships… there’s certain things we can’t export to cruise ships as yet, so we need to close that gap really quick,” he said.
Hill stressed that resolving the issue requires coordination between government agencies and industry stakeholders.
“That is a scientific relationship between both the Ministry of Agriculture and industry and the infrastructure being put in place so that we can close that gap as fast as possible,” he added.
Director of the Barbados National Standards Institution (BNSI), Hadyn Rhynd, said the creation of the National Agriculture and Health Food Control Agency (NAHFCA) is intended to strengthen the country’s sanitary and phytosanitary framework and support trade.
“The thinking was to strengthen the sanitary and phytosanitary standards, as you said, so that we can facilitate trade,” Rhynd explained.
He noted that international commerce is increasingly governed by strict global standards, which countries must meet in order to participate fully.
“The trade environment is such that international trade is really based on international standards,” he said.
Rhynd also pointed out that Barbados continues to strengthen its regulatory framework through partnerships with international and regional standards bodies.
“BNSI, we do have very strong partnerships. One, we’re a member of the ISO – the International Standards Organisation,” he said.
He added that the institution recently moved to formalise dozens of standards designed to support trade and regulatory compliance.
“We were fortunate to provide to the minister for assent and have gazetted, I think it was a few months ago… late last year, we gazetted 44 standards, many of them related to trade,” Rhynd said.
Some of those standards were developed in collaboration with the Caribbean Regional Organisation for Standards and Quality (CROSQ), helping to align Barbados with wider regional and international frameworks.
“The focus here was to have the regional and international agreement where Barbados too can have standards,” he said.
Rhynd warned that failure to align with international specifications could undermine the island’s ability to compete globally.
“The understanding is that if we are not competing with international standards in our space, we are losing the ability to trade freely,” he said.
“A lot of the requirements internationally are just that… the first bar that you have to jump over is an international specification.”
(SB)
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