On August 24 Jamaican Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller announced that her government would provide JA$225 million in emergency assistance to the country's agriculture sector, especially the parishes of Portland, Clarendon, St. Thomas, Manchester, St. Catherine and St. Elizabeth. JA$100 million was immediately allocated to the purchase of fertilizers, JA$25 million to the Blue Mountain coffee farmers, and the Agriculture Ministry's JA$50 million fruit tree programme was accelerated. She also announced that the National Housing Trust had established a JA$500 million programme to provide loans at 6% per annum for emergency repairs. The National Housing Trust also made JA$200 million available to the Hurricane Relief Fund. The government provided tarpaulins, 10,000 of which were shipped in after the storm, free of charge to patch houses with damaged roofs.