No decision to close Uitvlugt Sugar Estate – Agri Minister

Agriculture Minister Noel Holder has rejected reports that his Ministry had taken a decision to shut down the Uitvlugt Sugar Estate on the West Coast of Demerara. During a recent strike by cane cutters (cane harvesters) on the estate for compensation for “obstacles”, several of them had asserted that such a decision had in fact been made and that it was widely discussed on the Estate.

Speaking with Guyana Times International from Canada on Wednesday, however, Holder said no such decision has been taken, explaining that the Agriculture Ministry was still awaiting a report from the Commission of Inquiry (CoI) before any decision on the future of the sugar industry was taken. That report is expected to be delivered shortly. It was, therefore, surmised that the cane cutters might have heard the claim or inferred it when the CoI visited the estate.

The 11-member Commission was established in July with the aim of assessing the work of the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo). In the report that is required to be submitted shortly, the Commission is expected to submit a 15-year plan that will move the industry forward by addressing key issues such as the lack of profitability, and production.

This plan is expected to replace the revised version of the sugar industry’s 2013-2017 Strategic Plan. Under that plan, GuySuCo was expected to produce 350,000 tonnes of sugar by 2017.

Questioned on a decision which was taken by the former Agriculture Minister, Dr Leslie Ramsammy to accelerate mechanisation within the industry, Holder, in response, said though no decision has been made regarding the industry, manual labour was greatly preferred.

“Mechanisation will reduce the economic benefit of the country, in the sense that labour is Guyanese, machines are not…machines work with fuel and fuel is foreign exchange; therefore the economic benefit will be less,” Holder explained.

He further added that “there is nothing better than clean cut cane, you cut the cane and there is no brick, no stone, no mud, nothing,” as against machines which “pick up all kinds of junk”.

In 2014, the then Agriculture Minister had announced GuySuCo’s intention to accelerate its Mechanisation Programme to cushion the impact of a dwindling labour force. At the time, 30 per cent of the 48, 000 hectares of fields had been mechanised.

It was explained that sugar workers were downing their tools as they were capitalising on emerging commercial activities that are aiding in the transformation of Guyana’s economical landscape. Back in 1995, GuySuCo’s labour force stood at 24,000, but today it has dropped to below 18,000.