The Barbados 4-H Foundation has thrown out a public call for technically skilled volunteers to help expand its youth-focused development programs beyond their historical roots in agricultural training, according to Vice Chairman Osmond Harewood. The appeal was formally launched this Tuesday at the Ministry of Agriculture’s Animal Nutrition Unit located in The Pine, kicking off the organization’s new “Call to Volunteer” initiative.
Speaking to reporters on site, Harewood framed the effort as a straightforward but critical ask for community engagement. “Today we are making a simple yet important call. Give your time, share your talent, and help shape the future of all young people of our country,” he stated. Unlike common perceptions of volunteerism as just a donation of free time, Harewood emphasized that participating is fundamentally an investment in the nation’s next generation. “Volunteers bring knowledge, experience, creativity, and practical skills that can make a meaningful difference in the lives of our young people,” he added.
The core goal of the new recruitment drive is to strengthen the network of local 4-H clubs by growing the pool of available mentors, program leaders and skilled volunteers who can support the organization’s innovative 4-H Forward curriculum. This expanded curriculum covers a far broader range of topics than the foundation’s historic agricultural training, including natural resource management, healthy lifestyle education, leadership development, civic engagement, science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) training, and youth entrepreneurship.
Harewood noted that a common public misconception frames 4-H as an agriculture-only organization, and this program expansion is designed to correct that outdated view. “Sometimes people tend to think that 4-H is just agriculture, and I think we want to show this is more than agriculture,” he said. The foundation is specifically targeting candidates with expertise in high-demand areas including public speaking, organizational leadership, civic education, club operations and financial management, as it seeks to deepen the technical skill sets available to program participants. “What we are calling for is more technical skills within the clubs. All those basic areas are part and parcel of what we are looking for [in] persons to come and give the technical skills to those young persons,” Harewood explained.
Importantly, the vice chairman stressed that the foundation has not had to suspend any existing programming due to current volunteer shortages. Instead, the recruitment drive is focused on adding deeper, cross-disciplinary technical expertise to lighten the load for the foundation’s small full-time staff and open up new opportunities for youth. “There’s nothing we have put a pause on. What we are saying is that many hands make light work, and right now the work on the few staff that we have is pretty heavy,” he said. “We have skilled and talented persons in my business that could offer their services, but sometimes they’re waiting for somebody to call them. So we are saying yes, we need your skills.”
National Programme Coordinator Theodore Fraser echoed Harewood’s comments, highlighting youth entrepreneurship as a particularly high-priority area where additional volunteer support is urgently needed. “Definitely one of the areas is the whole emphasis on entrepreneurship,” Fraser said. He explained that while young participants already gain valuable hands-on skills through existing 4-H programs, the organization wants to help them turn those competencies into long-term, sustainable income and career opportunities. “How do we transfer this into something that they can build a career from or earn from as well?” Fraser asked, noting that the ultimate goal is to ensure young people can leverage their 4-H experience in meaningful, economically sustainable activities long after they graduate from secondary school.