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NIA CHARLESTOWN NEVIS-  In its continued pursuit of food sustainability on Nevis, the Ministry of Agriculture through the Department of Agriculture, is recording promising successes in food production.

Mr. Huey Sergeant, Permanent Secretary in the ministry, says the success is based on the demand for crops cultivated on the government-owned farms.

“Peanuts has performed exceptionally well. The demand and quality is phenomenal. We are actually harvesting peanuts again because of the response… Even when the peanuts was still in the ground, we were in a process of accepting huge orders because of that demand. Many persons were happy at the quality that they would have received.

“We are on the road to continue the production of peanuts on the island. We would have produced four acres last year and that still wasn’t enough…We have huge demands for much of the product.

“Sweet potato is something that we are quite proud of. It’s a traditional crop, yes, but the volumes in which it was produced was significantly lower than what is demanded…We are exploring ginger. Ginger is in high demand as well,” he said.

Mr. Sargeant also spoke on the growing demand for sorrel.

“The sorrel that we planted performed well, in that there is a demand for sorrel not just in the festive time but throughout the year. So we’ve embarked in Indian Castle in particular to do sorrel… We have sorrel down to as far as June based on our crop scheduling.

“We have three types of sorrel… We have pink sorrel; we have dark red that is black at the tips; and then we have what we call a white sorrel which is actually green, and all of them they’re doing quite well,” he said.

He noted there is also the demand for soursop and in order to keep up with the demand at the Nevis Agro Processing Centre, the department had to resort to cultivation on a commercial basis.

The department has also ventured into root cop production on the government owned farms and have planted cassava, tannia, ginger, cantaloupe, green banana, onion and sweet potato.

They are also cultivating beets, carrots, and other crops the farmers tend not to want to do and greenhouse sweet pepper.

Mr. Sargeant spoke to the progress at the government-owned farm at Indian Castle Estate where the focus is on tree crop cultivation.

“We would have planted in excess of 7,000 tree crops… We have citrus; we have cassava; we have over 4,000 coconut trees planted; we have mango; we have pomegranates; we have a lot of the crops that we found were not being heavily produced on the island in terms of tree crops.

“We explored sugar cane. We have passion fruit and so on… We have exotic things like the cane fig for example; we have soursop,” he said.

According to Mr. Sargeant, the imported coconut plants are progressing satisfactorily.

“The performance has literally been phenomenal of those coconut trees. I think…it’s 18 months before they start producing,” he said.

The trees, which were imported from Guyana, were brought to Nevis primarily to capture the jelly water market, primarily to reduce cost and provide a fresh product to consumers on Nevis, Mr. Sargeant explained

“We realise people have become a lot more conscious, and they are consuming a lot of jelly water. Sadly, the jelly water that is consumed, all of it is imported… so by the time they get here the shelf life is almost to the end of it.

“If we can get jelly produced on Nevis, that freshness is certainly an advantage. Hopefully, because it’s produced on Nevis and the transportation costs associated with jelly water now is going to be eliminated. We are doing all of this investment so that later on we can actually see a decrease in cost to the consumers,” he said.

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Canada’s ‘freedom’ protests resonate in US

 

© AP.

A Canadian protest that began with truck drivers protesting cross-border vaccination mandates has turned into an occupation of the capital city of Ottawa, as demonstrators have blocked traffic, disrupted businesses and threatened local residents for 12 days.

The protests have also mushroomed into broader rallies against most public health measures like masks and vaccinations, as well as against the Canadian government. The demonstrations are attracting members of the far-right movement, along with former President Trump and other GOP politicians, who have warned that the Biden administration may face similar unrest.

But much of the support is coming from our side of the border: polls show most Canadians don’t back the protests, and the country’s largest trucking industry group is distancing itself.

GOP love: “The Canadian truckers are heroes, they are patriots. They are marching for your freedom and for my freedom,” Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said Sunday on Fox News.

“Those truck drivers are defending Canada, but they’re defending America as well,” he added. “The government doesn’t have the right to force you to comply to their arbitrary mandates.”

On Friday, Trump released a statement slamming Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as a “far left lunatic” who “destroyed Canada with insane Covid mandates,” and invited American and Canadian truckers to come to Washington “to protest Biden’s ridiculous Covid policies.”

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The Covid jab Company, which the New-York based pharma firm developed with the much smaller German company BioNTech, brought in $12.5bn in revenues in the final quarter of 2021, taking the total for the year to $36.8bn. Pfizer said it had exceeded its target of manufacturing 3bn doses of the vaccine last year.

The drugmaker made a net profit of nearly $22bn last year, up from $9.1bn in 2020. It increased its 2022 estimate for Comirnaty sales to $32bn and expects Paxlovid to contribute $22bn in revenues.

The pill, which boasts nearly 90% success in preventing severe illness among vulnerable adults if taken soon after becoming infected with Covid-19, was approved for emergency use by the US regulator in late December.

A few days later, Paxlovid received the green light in the UK, where the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency described it as a “life-saving” treatment. It has now received emergency approval in 40 countries.

Albert Bourla, Pfizer’s chairman and chief executive, said that at the start of the pandemic it had “committed to use all of the resources and expertise we had at our disposal to help protect populations globally against this deadly virus”.

“Now, less than two years since we made that commitment, we are proud to say that we have delivered both the first FDA-authorised vaccine against Covid-19 (with our partner, BioNTech) and the first FDA-authorised oral treatment for Covid-19,” he said.

“These successes have not only made a positive difference in the world, but I believe they have fundamentally changed Pfizer and its culture for ever.”

The Covid vaccine, together with that produced by US rival Moderna and the much cheaper jab made by Britain’s AstraZeneca, has saved millions of lives worldwide.

However, pharmaceutical companies have been accused of not sharing the recipe for their vaccines, which would enable drugmakers in poorer countries to produce cheaper versions of them.

Global Justice Now pointed out that Pfizer’s Covid-19 jab was invented by BioNTech, supported by €100m (£84m) in debt financing from the publicly owned European Investment Bank and a €375m grant from the German government.

Tim Bierley, a pharma campaigner at the group, said: “The development of mRNA vaccines should have revolutionised the global Covid response.

“But we’ve let Pfizer withhold this essential medical innovation from much of the world, all while ripping off public health systems with an eye-watering mark-up.”

Moderna has said it would not enforce patent protection on its Covid vaccine, and last week scientists in South Africa said they had developed a copy of the jab. They hope it will boost vaccination rates across the continent, which are among the lowest in the world.

Bierley said: “It’s nothing short of pandemic profiteering for Pfizer to make a killing while its vaccines have been withheld from so many. Pfizer is now richer than most countries; it has made more than enough money from this crisis. It’s time to suspend intellectual property and break vaccine monopolies.”

Pfizer has charged the UK’s NHS an estimated £2.8bn above production cost for the 189m doses of Covid-19 vaccines the UK government has bought, Global Justice has calculated.

According to Reuters, Pfizer has sold the vaccine to African countries at $3 to $10 a shot. It has indicated that a non-profit dose costs just $6.75, or £4.98, to produce, but it has reportedly charged the NHS £18 a dose for the first 100m jabs bought and £22 a dose for the next 89m, totalling £3.76bn, Global Justice Now said – amounting to an eye-watering 299% mark-up.

Responding to Global Justice Now’s claims, a Pfizer spokesperson said it was “firmly committed to equitable and affordable access” to the Comirnaty jab.

They said: “High- and middle-income countries pay more than low-income countries, but at a value that is significantly discounted from our normal benchmarks, during the pandemic. Low- and lower-middle-income countries pay a not-for-profit price.

“However, we would highlight that the true costs of bringing this novel mRNA vaccine to patients include ongoing large-scale clinical studies and pharmacovigilance, continued and increased manufacturing efforts including process improvements, and global distribution and supply.

“Covid vaccines are complex biologic products, and their manufacturing requires specialised experience, expertise and equipment.

“It is not as simple as sharing the ‘recipe’. Manufacturing of the Pfizer and BioNTech Covid vaccine involves the use of over 280 materials. There is enormous collaboration already taking place.”

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Vaccine production suspended at J&J: report

 

© Getty Images

Johnson & Johnson temporarily halted production of its COVID-19 vaccine in the Netherlands, the only manufacturing hub making usable doses for the pharmaceutical company, according to a New York Times report on Tuesday.

The company stopped production of the vaccine at its facility in the Dutch city of Leiden at the end of 2021 and has instead turned its attention to making another vaccine for an unrelated virus, the Times reported. The pause is temporary and is expected to last just a month — but it could reduce Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine supply by a few hundred million doses.

While the Johnson & Johnson vaccine from Janssen Pharmaceuticals has been linked to rare blood clots and is considered less effective than Pfizer’s and Moderna’s shots by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, it is extremely important in Africa and low-income countries, which rely on the simpler one-dose shot.

The vaccine also avoids the requirement of storage in ultra-cold temperatures, which makes shipment of Moderna and Pfizer doses more difficult.

In October, Johnson & Johnson said it was committing about 50 million vaccines to 40 countries through COVAX, the vaccine-sharing initiative from the World Health Organization and the United Nations.

But Ayoade Alakija, a co-head of the African Union’s vaccine-delivery program, told the Times that switching up production could endanger the vaccination effort.

“This is not the time to be switching production lines of anything, when the lives of people across the developing world hang in the balance,”she said.

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WORLD  STATS

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Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron in Moscow, February 7, 2022 WORLD The Kremlin denied that Vladimir Putin had promised French President Emmanuel Macron that Russia would stage no further maneuvers near Ukraine for now, pouring cold water on a tentative French assertion of diplomatic progress. We report from Ukraine’s eastern frontiers, where citizens are trying to get on with their daily lives amid the fear of a Russian invasion. Hong Kong announced stringent new coronavirus restrictions and record new infections, while a shortage of vegetables added to the misery as truck drivers who tested positive for COVID-19 were unable to bring them from mainland China. Police in Canada’s capital said they had seized thousands of liters of fuel and removed an oil tanker as part of a crackdown to end an 11-day protest against COVID-19 measures, adding truck and protester numbers had fallen significantly. Hundreds of people protesting vaccine mandates and pandemic restrictions blocked streets outside New Zealand’s parliament with trucks and campervans, inspired by the demonstrations in Canada. The Saudi-led coalition has deployed newly formed units near Yemen’s Marib where battles have abated, according to military and government sources, as the warring sides hold their positions in the fight for energy-rich areas that has led to the war’s biggest escalation in years. Campaigning for the Philippines’ general election gets underway officially, with COVID-19 curtailing the traditional fanfare and big rallies and turning the focus to social media as the key battleground for the May 9 contest. Here are the key contenders.

People gather outside the City Hall during an anti-vaccine mandate protest in the Manhattan borough of New York City, February 7, 2022 U.S. Officials in New Jersey, Connecticut, Delaware, California and Oregon said they will lift indoor mask mandates for schools and other public places in coming weeks, seeking a return to “normalcy” as soaring COVID-19 infections fueled by the Omicron variant abate. The changes signal a growing inclination by political leaders in those states, all led by Democrats, to take pandemic-weary residents off an emergency footing. Dozens of U.S. Democratic lawmakers with the Congressional Black Caucus have urged the Justice Department to step up legal efforts to protect voting rights across the country, condemning what they say are “anti-democratic” Republican efforts to restrict ballot access for voters of color. The Supreme Court let Alabama use a Republican-backed map of the state’s congressional districts that a lower court found likely discriminates against Black voters. Right-wing television network Newsmax Media countersued Smartmatic, an election security firm that says it was defamed by Newsmax’s coverage of the 2020 presidential election. Smartmatic sued Newsmax in November for amplifying false claims that Smartmatic voting machines rigged the election against then-President Donald Trump. The United States faces heightened threats from extremist groups domestic and foreign, underscored by last month’s hostage standoff crisis in a Texas synagogue and bomb threats at many historically Black colleges and universities, a government agency said. The warning comes after some schools across the United States canceled classes and issued shelter-in-place orders last week. Abortion providers in liberal states are expanding clinics, training more staff and boosting travel assistance to prepare for an influx of patients from conservative states if the U.S. Supreme Court ends the constitutional right to the procedure.

BUSINESS SoftBank has shelved its blockbuster sale of Arm to U.S. chipmaker Nvidia valued at up to $80 billion citing regulatory hurdles and will instead seek to list the company. The Japanese conglomerate acquired Arm, whose technology powers Apple’s iPhone and nearly all other smartphones, in 2016 for $32 billion. BP’s profits hit their highest in eight years in 2021, lifted by soaring gas and oil prices, as the company boosted share repurchases and accelerated plans to cut emissions with increased spending on low carbon energy. Reverends, rabbis and other religious leaders urged Meta Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg to permanently stop the company’s plan for an Instagram version aimed at young users, in a letter sent by advocacy group Fairplay and their Children’s Screen Time Action Network. Meanwhile, TikTok is working on ways to rate and restrict content by age in order to prevent adult content from reaching teenage users of its short video app. When Japan handed Tokyo bus driver Keiki Nambu and his wife, Takako, $870 for each of their nine children, they spent it exactly as the government had feared: paying down a mortgage instead of going shopping. That kind of financial prudence represents a headache for policymakers, who are struggling to kick-start consumption and boost a moribund economy. As bitcoin drifts towards mainstream maturity in 2022, daring crypto investors are eyeing up new sources of explosive action: “altcoins” that power online games and worlds. But, be warned, the foothills of the unformed metaverse are no place for the faint-hearted.

WINTER OLYMPICS See our full coverage of the Beijing Games Nathan Chen earns redemption with world record

Quote of the day “If you inject poison into politics that has a whole set of unintended consequences” Brendan Cox Husband of Jo Cox, a British lawmaker stabbed to death in 2016 After Labour leader hounded, British PM Johnson under pressure over slur .

Video of the day Collection of Black history memorabilia up for auction The massive personal collection owned by 90-year-old Elizabeth Meaders traces the history of Black Americans and ranges from rare civil rights posters to Muhammad Ali’s shoes.

And finally… World’s glaciers contain less ice than thought

The revised estimate reduces global sea level rise by 3 inches if all glaciers were to melt. But it raises concern for some communities that rely on seasonal melt from glaciers to feed rivers and irrigate crops.

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