One trade expert is warning that a failure to urgently boost food security in the Caribbean and Africa will result in a disaster of epic proportions in coming years.This warning has come from Executive Director of the International Trade Centre (ITC) Pamela Coke-Hamilton, who also called on the Caribbean to move with haste in reducing its food import bill.Raising concern about the region’s growing vulnerability to external shocks, Coke-Hamilton told delegates at the AfriCaribbean Trade and Investment Forum 2022 that “something is wrong in the way our global food system works”.“Something is wrong with the continued commodity dependence in developing countries. We can no longer survive on the last rung of the value chain’s ladder,” she warned.“If we don’t act now to boost food security, we will have a crisis of epic proportions on our hands. Here in the Caribbean we need to address the combined issue of hunger and nutrition. Our food consumption patterns in recent years have resulted in high levels of food imports,” she said.
