AGRICULTURE Minister Clarence Rambharat said on Thursday, Government is wisely using the $500 million allocation it received in the 2021 budget to develop initiatives that will help the domestic agriculture sector and TT as a whole.

He made those comments before the Standing Finance Committee of the House of Representatives approved an allocation of $709,144,000 to his ministry for fiscal 2022.

Recalling the interest shown by the Opposition and the population about the $500 million agriculture stimulus in the 2021 budget, Rambharat said, “This is a fund created under the Ministry of Finance."

After noting Finance Minister Colm Imbert's mention of this fund during the committee's meeting on Wednesday, Rambharat said, "The funds are made available to the ministry to use as required.

“I want to say right away that if anybody expected that cheques would have been written and handed out to people in the way that they have done it in the US, that is not the intent of it."

Rambharat said, "I could say that we've made commitments in respect of $400 million of that $500 million."

He said this funding includes projects such as "two homestead projects..particularly in El Reposo (Sangre Grande) and Talparo." He also said commitments have been made to projects within the ministry "to the tune of about $20 million.

"We made commitments and we made payments in respect of the food box covid-relief programme." This sum, he said, was approximately $62.5 million.

Rambharat said commitments were made for a road-development programme to the tune of $80 million. He said $18 million was committed to digital transformation and would play a role in efforts to improve land management in Trinidad and Tobago.

On the $300 million allocation mentioned by Imbert in his budget presentation in the House on October 4, Rambharat said "This represents the component of that $500 million, that we believe we will ask the Minister of Finance to pay in this fiscal year."

He reiterated, "What I have described is those things that are being developed and ready for tender and ready for implementation."

Rambharat also said efforts are being made to improve the praedial larceny squad with the recruitment of 30 additional officers in fiscal 2022. Recalling that a review of the squad was done in 2016, Rambharat said there were instances of some officers damaging vehicles or using them for non-agricultural activities.

He said Couva North MP Ravi Ratiram could be engaging in a myth of magical vehicles when he alleged that only the squad's vehicles in South and Central Trinidad were not working. On Ratiram's insistence that he directly ensure the squad is functional, Rambharat said this was "a complete misunderstanding of (the role) of a minister."