Farmers of the year announced

They are the men and women whose untiring work keeps a hungry nation well fed. And every year, Belize’s top agriculturalists are celebrated for their outstanding efforts with the naming of the farmers of the year. The judges have made their decisions and the 2003 award for woman farmer of the year goes to eighteen year old Ana Marilu Lazo of Bomba Village in the Belize District. In addition to small herds of dairy and beef cattle, Lazo is also involved in the cultivation of vegetables and maintains two acres of citrus, which she sells in Belize City. In the junior division, fifteen-year-old Byron Arnulfo Arrevalo of Seven Miles, Mountain Pine Ridge Road, Cayo took the top prize for his work in the Upper Barton Creek area. Arrevalo produces a variety of vegetables and livestock, which he supplies to the local market in Cayo. And in the senior category, the man who got the nod is thirty-seven year old Luis Enrique Chan from Corozal. He has a sixty-acre farm in Consejo Village where he produces fruits and vegetables, for both the local and export markets. He also raises beef cattle, sheep and pigs. The farmers of the year will be honoured at the National Agriculture and Trade Show on May sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth at the Show Grounds in Belmopan.