Sandals Resorts International (SRI) continues to make a concerted effort to support and buy from the Jamaican farming industry and local manufacturing sector.
Jamaica’s leading hotel group spends over $500 million a year which equates to 5.4 million pounds of produce for its hotels.
Speaking at a luncheon in Montego Bay, Sandals’ group director, procurement division, Jordan Samuda said: “our Chairman’s message has always been to ‘buy local’, and this is precisely what we do for the vast majority of our produce needs here in Jamaica. Of the 5.4 million pounds of produce that we consume annually… 90 per cent or 5 million pounds is 100 per cent Jamaican. This equates to over $500 million spent with local farmers.”
If the agricultural sector is to make a greater contribution to Jamaica’s GDP, then its fortunes would look a lot brighter if the hotel sector decided to buy the majority of its produce from the local sector, rather than import agricultural goods.
This point was not lost on Samuda who declared: “we however feel that whilst Sandals will continue to lead the way in supporting the agricultural sector, we need greater commitment from the wider hotel sector. Sandals has 2,500 rooms in Jamaica, which equates to roughly 2,000 pounds of produce annually per room.
“If we use those numbers to spread across the sector, with roughly 30,000 active hotel rooms the annual impact can very quickly become $6 billion of local produce.”
The argument put forward to rebut this line of thinking is that Jamaican farmers lack consistency, and the quality of their produce can sometimes be suspect. Some of the more recent foreign chains like to purchase from suppliers that they have a pre-existing relationship with, and so forgo Jamaican farmers.
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