“I want to leave behind a legacy,” says Luis Rojas, Pantrepant Farm manager. Rojas came to the farm as an exchange student from Costa Rica’s Earth University, and has spent the last four years helping Island Outpost founder Chris Blackwell manage his farm in Jamaica’s Cockpit Country. Rojas has backed Blackwell’s mission to sustainably grow products for Island Outpost guests, supplying the restaurants at GoldenEye and The Caves.
This April, Rojas launched Pantrepant Crates, an effort to bring items from the farm to the community beyond Cockpit Country. The concept, similar to CSAs (community-supported agriculture memberships), gives locals access to Pantrepant’s high quality, locally grown produce.
Subscribers of the service pick up their crate at Montego Bay’s The Wright Shop, next to Fontana Pharmacy, every Friday. “We want to be able to bring our products from the farm to the city,” says Rojas. The crates range from 4,000 to 5,000 Jamaican dollars ($30-$40 USD), and are stocked with kale, swiss chard, lettuce, arugula, cilantro, parsley, cabbage, bok choy—all depending on the farm’s harvest.
You won’t find many of these products in the supermarkets in Jamaica, says Rojas, which is why the service already has a waitlist. “Since we’ve launched, we’ve had more customers than the amount of crates we are able to produce.” Currently only delivering to the Montego Bay area, Rojas has his sights on expanding the delivery service to Ocho Rios and even Kingston. “We will grow slow but steady,” he says.
