In light of the revised Guyana Sugar Corporation production targets, the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) is concerned about the percentage of earnings for its represented workers in terms of production incentives.
The corporation has revised its 2010 production target from the 280,000 tonnes to 264,063 tonnes as a result of early months of a dry spell and industrial relations woes. At 81,862 tonnes, Guysuco’s first crop production for the year pales in comparison to last year’s, which was 83,356 tonnes. But the company is expecting a decent second crop for 2010 based on the intense land preparation that took place late last year and into this year. The target for the second crop this year is 182,201, while last year’s result for the second crop was 150,380 tonnes. Last year’s total production was 233,736 tonnes, beaten only by 2008’s production of 226,000 tonnes.
Speaking to this newspaper yesterday, President of GAWU Komal Chand said that this will certainly present a challenge to the workers, whose production incentive will certainly take a hit because of the low production over the past years.
According to the latest edition of the Union’s organ, ‘Combat’, Guysuco continues to be unable to achieve its modest production targets it sets itself.

“Sugar production over the last few years has been unacceptably low. Last year’s production, like the last few years, lagged behind budgeted production; it fell short by 16,265 tonnes of its revised target and 56,625 tonnes as against its original target. This year, despite a low first crop target of 91,675 tonnes, the Corporation only produced 81,862 tonnes sugar, the lowest first crop production since 1991,” the GAWU publication said.

According to the publication, the Corporation this time blamed the El Nino weather condition for its low production. “The Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) learnt that approximately 400 hectares of canes were not harvested. It was not necessarily due to the dry weather. The unharvested canes would have realised an additional 2,250 tonnes of sugar – still a significant production deficit of 7,563 tonnes.

The Union is contending that while the dry weather might have affected a few of the navigational canals which are used to transport canes from the fields to the factory, it improved the sucrose content of the canes. “Thus the Tonnes Cane to Tonne Sugar (TC/TS) ratio was better than forecast and therefore the yield of sugar per tonne was to the Corporation’s advantage,” the Union said.

GAWU is of the view that the Skeldon Estate, through its new factory, should have performed the best of all the estates. “It turned out to be the worst, utilising 14.7 tonnes of cane to produce a tonne of sugar. The other seven factories utilised an average of 10.8 tonnes of cane to produce a tonne of sugar,” the publication said.

The Union said that all attention will now be focused on the second crop production this year. “The Corporation assured recently through its Deputy Chief Executive Officer that the Corporation would realise the year’s target of 280,000 tonnes. It is an uphill task noting the low production in the first crop. The sixty-four dollar question is, does the Corporation have enough canes in the fields to achieve the target?” asked the Union.

GAWU laments that although sugar has been grown in Guyana for more than 350 years, the Corporation cannot achieve decent production targets for the last five years.

“Each year it was found that adequate canes were not in the field across the industry as claimed by the Corporation. Guysuco must be more accurate with its estimation/determination of the crop,” said the union.

According to the Union, the importance of the industry to the economy and all Guyanese requires Guysuco to be more responsible, noting the pivotal role sugar plays in the livelihood of every Guyanese.