Business View Caribbean | July 2019

43 BUSINESS VIEW CARIBBEAN JULY 2019 FRED M. JONES ESTATES LTD . will be other growers, but it all comes down to being productive, keeping your costs down, and making the best possible margin.” Looking to the future, Nicholas anticipates a strong focus on land development. He notes, “We will have quite a few real estate offerings because spots with white sand beaches on the Caribbean Sea are becoming rare – gobbled up by the big hotels. With the advent of the new southeastern highway, which will go right through our lands, opportunities for land developments will increase. I think that will take precedence over most everything. The direct agricultural production will see some change in the land ownership, with people taking up these 50-acre blocks which I’m able to sub-lease. So, we’ll see quite a bit of commercial agriculture activity taking place. The mainstays of our company will be coconuts, beef cattle, and cassava. I believe we’ll be doing some value added with coconut oil and coconut water, whether undertaking it ourselves or with joint venture partnerships.” One other particularly honorable undertaking by FMJ is the establishment of a crocodile sanctuary on their land – hoping to produce over 200 crocodile hatchlings a year, in order to re-establish the crocodile population in and around Jamaica. Speaking passionately for the cause, Nicholas states, “The crocodiles have been dying off, mostly from poaching and ill treatment. But they are very important for keeping our swamps clean. We have developed a sanctuary, with our own herpetologist onsite, and we’re working along with the authorities. Put it this way: the crocodile is on our Jamaican coat of arms, so we need to keep this fellah alive.” pictured below Senior Unit Manager, Howard Wright