Agriculture and fisheries suffer $29.5b loss from Hurricane Melissa
/ Our Today
administrator
Agriculture Minister Floyd Green said the damage to Jamaica’s farming and fishing industries from Hurricane Melissa is unprecedented, with losses estimated at $29.5 billion across crops, livestock, and infrastructure.
Speaking in Parliament yesterday, Minister Green said the Category 5 storm, which made landfall on October 28, has left thousands of farmers without livelihoods and reversed the sector’s strong production gains.
“The impact of Hurricane Gilbert pales in comparison,” Green told the House of Representatives, noting that 41,390 hectares of farmland and more than 70,000 farmers were affected.
The most severely impacted parishes are Westmoreland, St James, Hanover, and St Elizabeth, some of Jamaica’s most productive agricultural regions.
Vegetable crops, bananas, tubers, and fruit trees were extensively damaged, while over 1.25 million animals, including poultry, pigs, cattle, and small ruminants, were lost.
Livestock damage alone totals more than $3 billion, while losses to domestic crops are estimated at $8.8 billion. The fisheries sector also suffered $5.76 billion in losses, with 3,289 vessels, or 45% of the national fleet, damaged.
Green said the hurricane also inflicted $4.3 billion in damage to farm roads and $1.5 billion to ministry facilities, calling the overall destruction “heart-wrenching.”
The minister added that the mining sector sustained infrastructure damage to several quarries and bauxite operations but noted that major producers, Windalco, Jamalco, and Discovery Bauxite, have resumed operations.
Despite the devastation, Green praised the resilience of farmers and fishers, saying the government remains committed to helping them recover.
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