My God!!!! yinna crying already!!! Yinna voted for a gang of lackeys who pride themselves on being the facilitators of those minority of businessmen who are determine to rape, pillage and plunder the Bahamian economy and people with impunity. :hammer: Now I wake up this morning and suddenly Yinna hollering about the price of orange juice and veggies???!!!
Cry babies, cry babies!!

where the hell have you been living in the past 20 years? not in the Bahamas I presume. Prices on food items have been going up for years. How the hell do you think they got as high as they are. Oh that's right they just went up about a month ago when the fnm got in power. Give us a break!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

where the hell have you been living in the past 20 years? not in the Bahamas I presume. Prices on food items have been going up for years. How the hell do you think they got as high as they are. Oh that's right they just went up about a month ago when the fnm got in power. Give us a break!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

pepper, what gave you the idea that common sense has any place in the statements of die-hards?

someone said inflation was an issue but how can that be? food in nassau already cost 2-3 times more than in the usa so how could they possible be asking for more?

someone was sayin due to the price of juice they just drink kool aid and some otha drink. i would encourage that person to simple drink water if they cant afford juice becuase kool aid is simple not a healthy drink. i thank god my kids (if i eva have any) will neva know what kool aid taste like.

I mean it could happen, if you have contracts and you can't meet them - then your business goes elsewhere.
But in this scenario it is baffling that it happened. If I'm supposed to supply 50 cars and I'm late supplying them, then my buyer goes somewhere else, I may have a hard time unloading those 50 cars. But chicken in the Bahamas is a staple. If you start selling chicken from the back of a car on the side of wulff road people will stop and buy it.
No, staple produce in the Bahamas should be imported. Its just silly. All of this stuff can and should be made at home, much much cheaper than importing it. I know I keep saying and everybody knows it. But nobody's doing it. Including me. I would love to go in with a group of Bahamians and start in Abaco, Andros and Eleuthera. All fish, chicken, beef, pork, fruits and vegetables produced at home. But in order to expand, the government has to provide the infrastructure to these islands - which they've been lacking since the 1970s.


Gladstone couldn't compete with the US. Once highly diversified, with nearly every farm producing chickens, the industry is now highly concentrated: The top four processors, led by giant Tyson Foods, control more than 56 percent of production.

Tyson and other giants have consolidated their power by purchasing chicken feed for low prices. As soybean and corn prices dropped 21 percent and 32 percent, respectively, after the passage of the US 1996 farm bill, the chicken industry effectively collected a subsidy of $1.25 billion a year since then. The individual farmer cannot compete. They have to pay full price for the grain whereas conglomerates like Tyson do not. These agribusinesses control both the price of the chicken, and the price of the feed and local grown chicken cannot compete.

I must admit, that when it comes to buying expensive items like meat, I would buy the most inexpensive rather than pay more for local grown, which was not better in quality.

These large American corporations are a thorn in the side for the economies of third world and developing countries.

Lurker:

I thought someone said most of the chicken was imported from Conagra Foods. Conagra isn't Tyson. Conagra produces its own chicken feed (Conagra Mills) so they aren't getting any government subsidies - essentially they are paying full price.

In what market does Tyson control 56 percent?? The US?? Global?? They only control it if local producers fold. Now when the price of corn is shooting through the roof thanks to ethanol - actually ethanol is causing the price of almost every food to shoot theough the roof - it is costing Tyson and Conagra foods more and more every day. The Bahamas is untouched by this. But then again, corn feed is not something we should be importing either.

I must admit, when it comes to buying food, I would buy Bahamian before I buy an import. What if Tyson starting selling conch, bonefish, jelly coconut, guineps, sugar apple and breadfruit??

At least the one thing I know about Bahamian meat, there are no steriods, hormones or other chemicals in it. And you wonder why Americans are getting cancer, alzheimers, and so many other diseases and mental illnesses - because their foods are unnatural.

.... What if Tyson starting selling conch, bonefish, jelly coconut, guineps, sugar apple and breadfruit??


http://www.caicosconchfarm.com/

These large American corporations are a thorn in the side for the economies of third world and developing countries.

*claps
now imagine we're in the FTAA or some other free trade network. Not only o they rape us with their economies of scale, we can't even charge duty on it...

*claps
now imagine we're in the FTAA or some other free trade network. Not only o they rape us with their economies of scale, we can't even charge duty on it...


In order to do that they, I'm referring to Tyson Foods or Conagra Foods, would have to build a plant in the Bahamas - until then, nobody should be able to touch the local food providers particularly with staple items.

http://www.caicosconchfarm.com/


Turks and Caicos is going to take all of the tourism out of the Bahamas. If you watch the travel channel or pay attention to what american celebrities are saying - no longer is it fashionable to visit the Bahamas or have a home in the Bahamas. Now its fashionable to visit Turks and Caicos - they have two of the top five resorts in the western hemisphere. Atlantis is only in the top ten. I keep saying, the Bahamas is going to sink itself. Tourism is not solid. Because Nassau will eventually implode. The only thing left will be the family islands but with no infrastructure.

*claps
now imagine we're in the FTAA or some other free trade network. Not only o they rape us with their economies of scale, we can't even charge duty on it...



That's why 'globalisation' has to be managed in developing countries.

No, you can't close yourself of in a xenophobic frenzy, but you sure can't swing the trade doors wide open without a decent plan. You'd get your tail handed to you!

Our economy is too dependent on an unstable product (tourism) that folds at the slightest breed. I won't even mention the service levels and underproduction.


~~~

Turks and Caicos is going to take all of the tourism out of the Bahamas. If you watch the travel channel or pay attention to what american celebrities are saying - no longer is it fashionable to visit the Bahamas or have a home in the Bahamas. Now its fashionable to visit Turks and Caicos - they have two of the top five resorts in the western hemisphere. Atlantis is only in the top ten. I keep saying, the Bahamas is going to sink itself. Tourism is not solid. Because Nassau will eventually implode. The only thing left will be the family islands but with no infrastructure.



T&C and the Dominican Republic. Heck even I was sorely tempted to build in the DR. Cheap land and a huge modern house for under $150K. A maid gardener and as many servants as you can afford.

If you can deal with the petty crime (no worse than Nassau in Santo Domingo, much better in the North) you are golden.

God help us when Fidel dies. The Canadians have all ready carved up Cuba and are going to take full advantage of that cheap labour market and all those natural resources Fidel only dribbles out now.

The Bahamas better pray Papi Fidel's got a good 10 years left. We have to act now or get seriously left behind.

Gladstone couldn't compete with the US. Once highly diversified, with nearly every farm producing chickens, the industry is now highly concentrated: The top four processors, led by giant Tyson Foods, control more than 56 percent of production.
Tyson and other giants have consolidated their power by purchasing chicken feed for low prices. As soybean and corn prices dropped 21 percent and 32 percent, respectively, after the passage of the US 1996 farm bill, the chicken industry effectively collected a subsidy of $1.25 billion a year since then. The individual farmer cannot compete. They have to pay full price for the grain whereas conglomerates like Tyson do not. These agribusinesses control both the price of the chicken, and the price of the feed and local grown chicken cannot compete.
I must admit, that when it comes to buying expensive items like meat, I would buy the most inexpensive rather than pay more for local grown, which was not better in quality.

In addition to this, on top of the $1.25 billion the chicken farmers get, the U.S. shells out $380 billion in farm subsidies, which to them, only relates to 1% of GDP. So the case is market access, and you are right, countries like the U.S. and the E.U CAP policy (which subsidizes farms up to €55 billion/ roughly $65 billion), makes it virtually impossible to penetrate your own market, let along a foriegn market.

This is why I am not so averse to infant industry protection, or industrial policy, if it means putting capital back into the hands of Bahamian producers, who will spend at least some of it, if not at an optimum level, back into the economy...but some folk's like Free Trade. Let the "market forces" prevail!
:taped2:

However, even before we start to discuss market forces, even if we were to ask Mr. Cartwright, or any elected official in the house, along with people in BAIC or the Min of Agriculture, what infant industry protection is, let along what it entails along with ideas like strategic trade policy, you would probably just be better off asking me on how to define the metaphysics of carbon based pen-holders.
:)

Boy you special nah! Food prices have been going up for months now following the sale of Winn Dixie to that Bahamian conglomerate. Ever heard of CONTEXT my friend?

The Context is unleashing the Barons of Profiteering on the Bahamian people and its economy.

:hammer: Keeping the location of Cargo Ports in the hands of a few Bay Street Abaco families and thereby controlling the movement of food stuffs and cargo in and out of the Bahamas to ensure that historic Profiteering of the little band of elite Property owners to continue in perpetuity until Christ comes.

Alien:

US GDP in 2006 was 13 trillion. One percent of that is 130 billion. And 65 Billion dollars is less than 48 billion euros.