Vere Johan Oliver

About Us
The Gilbert Agricultural & Rural Development Center (GARDC) is a leading training facility, targeting youth and women providing positive entrepreneurial and employment alternatives.

Winner of the Inter-American award for the participation of women in Rural Development 1998-99, in international public recognition of the important contributions to the development of agriculture and to improving the quality of rural life.

GARD Center is an ecumenical program of The Methodist Church in the Caribbean and the Americas (MCCA)

Background
The Gilbert Agricultural & Rural Development Center (GARDC) is located on the historic Gilbert’s Estate in Antigua and Barbuda in the Eastern Caribbean. The property is owned and managed by the Trust of the Methodist Church in the Caribbean & the Americas (MCCA).

The GARD Center evolved as an entity from a two year pilot project which was implemented in 1989 as a collaborative effort amongst the MCCA, the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA)/Canada Training Awards Project (CTAP), and the Government of Antigua-Barbuda.

The mission of this pilot project was to train young people in practical agriculture and to demonstrate and promote farming as a worthy and viable occupation. This mission evolved from CIDA/CTAP’s recognition that the average age of the Caribbean farmer was 50 years, and it was apparent that the younger generation was not selecting agriculture or its related industries as an occupational choice.

Farming unfortunately was viewed by many young people as drudgery, high risk and not a viable means to increase one’s standard of living. With this reality in mind, a collaborative partnership was formed involving:

The MCCA who provided the land for a demonstration farm, classroom and office facilities.
The CIDA/CTAP who contributed financial support for a Consultant, Project Manager, Tutors, trainee stipends and training materials.
The Government of Antigua-Barbuda who contributed utilities, technical staff from the Ministry of Agriculture and provision of lands for the graduates of the programs.
Because of the success of the two-year pilot project, the MCCA and the project management saw the need to broaden the objectives of the project and establish a full time training and rural development center. As a rural development and training center, the GARD Center has responded to changing trends as it tries to prevent a threatened drop in the standard of living. Since 1993 the Center had offered agricultural and enterprise training to youth between the ages of sixteen and thirty since 1993. In 1996 the Center began targeting the training of unemployed and low-income women. This training focused on life skills and entrepreneurial skills with specific emphasis in the use of natural resources in agriculture and other forms of rural enterprises. It is with this background that the GARDC has developed it pace setting-programs as an effective response in targeting youth and women in an effort to improve their welfare and standard of living and to address and ensure their continued development and sustainability. It is in this context, through the mechanism of the MCCA, that GARDC was created as a social investment in people.

Business Development Unit
The GARD Center has functioned over the years in a national environment that lacks a business culture, where programmes and services were focused on job creation and did not include entrepreneurship. The Center’s available resources allowed limited entrepreneurial training only- access to credit through a revolving loan fund, and business plan development. New entrepreneurs, on leaving the programme, had ‘to source assistance on their own in an environment with limited support services from Government or other agencies.’

GARD Center seeks to address this gap in support services to its young entrepreneurial graduates with special focus on vulnerable women and therefore will develop its capacity to do so through the establishment of a Business Development Unit (BDU).
It envisages a BDU that provides ‘post training’ services which cater to the special needs of women, help to build their self-esteem and confidence and lead to greater control of their destiny. It is expected also that the BDU will help the Center to foster closer linkages with the Caribbean Group of Youth Business Trusts, of which it is now a member.

• VISION- ‘To enhance the business culture of Antigua and Barbuda through the provision of business services to new and existing entrepreneurs.’
• MISSION- ‘To improve the income generating capacities of vulnerable young women in Antigua and Barbuda through the provision of gender-responsive vocational and entrepreneurial training and identified support services.’

The BDU is described as a ‘one stop shop’ training center and business services provider for new and existing entrepreneurs. The BDU is sensitive to gender issues. It will be the main facilitator for all follow up business development services and will monitor the progress of the new ‘entrepreneur.’

Other services of the BDU are:

To provide gender sensitization training to our stakeholders.
To provide necessary tools for knowledge, skills proficiency leading to employment, expansion of careers, etc.
To make available books, reports on pertinent surveys, and such resources for business development opportunities.
Operational and strategic business services.
The use of information and communications in business, management of accounts and tax records, business planning and assistance with compliance with various regulations.
Strategic services in identifying and servicing markets, designing products, setting up facilities, and seeking financing.
Matching entrepreneurs with business mentors for up to three years if required who would provide guidance, moral support, assistance in setting up networks, etc.