Santo Domingo.- The Dominican Agribusiness Board (JAD) CEO Osmar Benitez on Sunday criticized the Agriculture Ministry’s payroll of 17,000 in a country which exports only US$800.0 million per year, while Chile’s par employees just 1,500, but whose exports exceed US$10.0 billion annually.He  said Chile has only one deputy Agriculture minister, whose function is to replace the incumbent, compard with Dominican Republic’s 39, some even without an assigned office.

Agro investment

Benitez  said the government budget should be reoriented toward spending in the rural areas, to reach farm production.He said that, according to a study of

He said of the Inter-American Development Bank’s (IDB) total funding for agriculture, 70% goes to payroll and other bureaucratic costs, with only 30% for investment.Benitez noted that Agriculture Ministry agronomists don’t even visit farms and instead work for  agrochemical dealers selling their products.

As an example the business leader cited that there’s an Agriculture office around half a mile from his farm,  but he has never seen the area’s representative."The truth is that there’s a need to do what’s never been done," Benitez said, paraphrasing president elect Danilo Medina’s campaing slogan.