The commitment between the tourism and agriculture sectors to get more locals to supply fresh produce to hotels is succeeding.

Many farmers have been able to successfully strike deals with hotels.

The Agriculture Ministry is ensuring that more farmers are able to supply their produce to the hotels.

Minister for Tourism, Faiyaz Koya says this engagement started even before the COVID-19 pandemic and some improvements have been noted.

“We’ve actually been talking about it for many months and years so that our farmers can supply our hotels because it is a massive industry. You would have seen from all the measures that have been put in place earlier that encouragement has been given to farmers. “

Koya says the aim is to move away from being too reliant on imports. However, Koya confirmed that to date, the majority of fresh produce in hotels is imported, but work is in the pipeline to reduce this.