St. Thomas, Virgin Islands– USDA MPPTA Client Spotlight
Meet Triple H Ranch, Inc., a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and horse rescue located on the island of St. Thomas in the US Virgin Islands. They have big dreams of improving food security across the island by opening a mobile meat processing business. The island currently has no meat processing facilities for its livestock producers, but there is an older facility in need of refurbishing.
As a whole, the Virgin Islands currently imports 95% of their meat (and other food) by ship from the US mainland and Puerto Rico. In addition, the small amount of meat they produce is not being processed efficiently to sell due to their geographical circumstances. Right now, the only processing facility in operation in the Virgin Islands on the island of St. Croix where the animals must traverse 30 miles of ocean on a barge, and then the renderings are returned to St. Thomas on the barge days later. This process is cumbersome, lengthy, impractical, and not financially viable for producers or the demographic purchasing the end product.
In April 2024, Flower Hill Institute's Regional Directors of Technical Assistance, Dave Carter and Chris Roper, made a site visit to St. Thomas to meet with the US Virgin Islands Department of Agriculture and assess the existing St. Thomas Abattoir.
Stay tuned for updates from these resilient folks!