Debt to rice farmers…
GENERAL Manger of the Guyana Rice Development Board (GRDB), Mr. Jagnarine Singh said an audit is expected to be done, soon, to reconcile the famers’ claims for monies.

That company has not been making payments to the producers and has been taken to Court by several of them, over a $300M debt for paddy supplied from the last crop.

General Secretary of the Rice Producers Association (RPA), Mr. Dharamkumar Seeraj has charged that, in some instances, the non-payment is a deliberate act to ensure that the planters remain bound to the company.

He said the mill spent some US$100,000 to purchase fertiliser and that sum could have been paid to farmers.

“We see that each time Mahaicony Rice Mill makes a significant investment the farmers suffer,” Seeraj said, mentioning, as well the investment on the ownership of Blairmont Estate.

He said farmers’ paddy is bought and sold and the profits are taken mostly not to pay them but to support capital investments.

Seeraj said the use of rice money to facilitate other ventures rather than pay farmers an intermingling with funds that is not acceptable.