JAMAICA. 



BULLETIN 



OF THE 



BOTANICAL DEPARTMENT. 



New Series.] JULY, 1901. 



CURING AND PACKING PRODUCE. 



By C. E. deMercado. 



Mr. Charles DeMercado gave a lecture last year to the teachers un- 

 dergoing a course of agricultural training at Hope His subject was 

 the curing and packing of Island produce. He kindly promised to 

 revise the lecture as published by the "Gleaner," but time and oppor- 

 tunity have been wanting, and it is felt that it would be a pity to de- 

 lay any longer its appearance in the bulletin. 



Mr. DeMercado said it gave him a great deal of pleasure to address 

 his audience, not only about the proper methods of curing and pre- 

 paring Jamaican products for foreign markets, but also for home con- 

 sumption. We still had a great deal to learn about properly supply- 

 ing our own local markets ; there were a lot of little points in that 

 connection which might be very profitably studied by agriculturists. 

 His hearers had been brought together to receive instruction in proper 

 agricultural methods, but it was as important to know what to do 

 with the crops after they were grown as to know how to grow them. 

 No crops were produced in Jamaica which did not have to undergo 

 some process of preparation for the market after they were grown, and 

 it was at that very point that most people failed. It was not enough 

 to grow the stuff ; it must be put upon the market whether home or 

 foreign, in the form most acceptable to the market, so that the best 

 price might be obtained. In Jamaica there could be no doubt that 

 we depended entirely for our wealth upon agriculture, and his hearers 

 would therefore be doing the greatest good to the country if they 

 would impress upon those over whom they had influence the para- 

 mount necessity of placing agriculture upon a proper basis There was 

 no other field of employment in Jamaica which offered such prospeets 

 of wealth to a man as agriculture, none which conduced so much tc the 

 prosperity of the country. That was why he had taken so much in- 

 terest in the subject, and had always contended that it was the most 

 important which the Government could take up. The merchants 

 knew very well that they were not of so much importance to the 

 country — though they were a necessary go-between — as those who 

 added to its wealth by agriculture. 



Vol. VIII. 

 "Part 7. 



