Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley and Trade Min­is­ter Paul Gopee-Scoon have re­spond­ed to the in­spi­ra­tional sto­ry of Le­ston Ri­vas who es­tab­lished a thriv­ing co­co­peat busi­ness af­ter he be­came job­less last year.

Ri­vas, 34, of Senon Vil­lage, Ex­ten­sion Siparia, has been scour­ing the coun­try for co­conut shells which he dries and us­es to make high-grade co­co­peat soil, co­conut fi­bre and mulch.

On a breezy hill­side in Siparia, he toils with the help of his friends Quinn Bar­clay and Cur­lon Car­ring­ton, some­times grat­ing the co­conut husks by hand.
With for­eign co­co­peat al­most dou­bling in price and sup­plies at an all-time low, Ri­vas has been pro­duc­ing 60 bags per week even though the de­mand for his prod­ucts is much high­er.

Ri­vas does not have a prop­er shed to dry, sort, grind or store the sup­plies but he still sells his prod­ucts at a rea­son­able price, sav­ing bit by bit to ex­pand his busi­ness.
Guardian Me­dia reached out to the Prime Min­is­ter, Trade Min­is­ter Paula Gopee-Scoon, Agri­cul­ture Min­is­ter Clarence Ramb­harat and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ter Kaz­im Ho­sein.

Dr Row­ley re­spond­ed via What­sapp say­ing, “I will look in­to it to see that he is en­cour­aged.” Min­is­ter Gopee-Scoon al­so said, “Thank you for bring­ing this to my at­ten­tion. I cer­tain­ly would have some­one lis­ten to his case to best un­der­stand his need at this time.”

Ri­vas told Guardian Me­dia that he was ex­cit­ed that his sto­ry had reached the ears of the Prime Min­is­ter and the Trade Min­is­ter. He said he want­ed to build four sheds so he can have a des­ig­nat­ed area for his op­er­a­tions.

“My dream is to set up a fac­to­ry next year and to pro­duce co­co­peat in a big­ger way to sup­port our lo­cal farm­ers and al­so to one day ex­port our high-qual­i­ty prod­uct,” he said.
Ri­vas added, “I am hop­ing the gov­ern­ment can as­sist me by hav­ing maybe more farm­ing ex­pos or farm­ing flea mar­kets for en­tre­pre­neurs like my­self to show­case our skills and prod­ucts.

This way we can be ex­posed to a wider cross-sec­tion of cus­tomers and we can al­so do more to in­spire and en­cour­age young en­tre­pre­neurs.”
Ri­vas said the pan­dem­ic had left many with­out jobs and hope. He rec­om­mend­ed that cit­i­zens go in­to farm­ing.

“This is not on­ly ther­a­peu­tic but it will al­so re­duce your food bill. You do not need a big space to plant crops,” he added.
Say­ing he dreamed that Ri­vas­co­co­peat will be­come a house­hold name.
“I would like the op­por­tu­ni­ty to mar­ket my­self so that my prod­uct will be­come a well-known na­tion­al and in­ter­na­tion­al prod­uct.

He added, “Ri­vas­co­co­peat be­lieves in sup­port­ing lo­cal. My prod­uct is more con­ve­nient and eas­i­er to use be­cause there is no need to hy­drate. Ri­vas­co­co­peat can al­so help farm­ers save mon­ey on pes­ti­cides and cer­tain soil treat­ments be­cause co­co­peat is nat­u­ral­ly an­ti­fun­gal and an­tibac­te­r­i­al. It is made right here in Trinidad so it is fresh­er and will take longer to break down.”

Ri­vas said he plans to send an email to the Trade Min­is­ter thank­ing her and the Prime Min­is­ter for reach­ing out. He al­so hopes to get his farm­ers badge. Any­one want­i­ng to con­tact Ri­vas can call 306-5826.

Re­porter: RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA