Chief Executive Officer of the Guyana Livestock Development Authority, (GLDA), Dr. Dwight Walrond, is rubbishing claims that the Black Belly Sheep breeding facility at Ellis in Region 5 is a white elephant.

 Instead, he is claiming that bad weather has been preventing works from being conducted on the facility.

Earlier this week, Opposition Leader Azruddin Mohamed, highlighted the state of the facility with video evidence of it not being utilized.

Mr. Mohamed said millions of dollars were spent on the project, but there’s not much that could celebrated about it.

During an interview on NCN this morning, Dr. Dwight Walrond said while the facility in Region 5 is just one of the breeding centres identified for the project. He noted that breeding operations have been expanded to two other locations that are currently functioning optimally.

“For Ellis (the facility in region five) we had some challenges, not in terms of remoteness, however, we had some unfortunate situation with the weather which we have no control over, we would have done a number of things there to ensure that once the opportunity presents itself that facility would be up and running,” Dr. Walrond said.

So far, he noted the drainage and irrigation works have been completed at the facility and soil testing has been done. However, he said the facility in Region 5 will be up and running, once the weather permits.

“We have an excess of 450 farmers who are involved in the rearing of blackbelly sheep and what we found is that we are now at the 3rd generation with some of these farms and we are now injecting fresh genetics into those farms of meaty breeds into those Barbados blackbelly (sheep) to give us a better product,” Dr. Walrond said.

Meanwhile, the Opposition Leader has also raised concerns about the state of the access road to the facility. He highlighted issues regarding the issuance of the contract for the road construction. However, the head of the National Drainage and Irrigation Authority, Mr. Nigel Wordsworth, said the project was issued through the National Tender and Administration board through the proper tender channel.

He said the road continues to serve as a farm to market road and provides access to farmers in the area.

“The carriageway is subject to quite a bit of use and it serves well; it is a 3. Kilometres long road and its a good project that was properly done and was certified by engineers who worked on the project,” Wordsworth said.

Launched in March 2022, the Guyana-Barbados Black Belly Sheep initiative is a agricultural project centered in Region Five, with its primary goal is to establish a regional mutton brand, increase local meat production to over 7,000 tonnes, and slash the region’s food import bill by 25%.

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