AGRICULTURE Minister, Dr. Leslie Ramsammy has been able to amend the previous rice deal with Venezuela so that now more rice than paddy will be exported to Guyana’s Spanish-speaking neighbour.Meanwhile, Guyana will be sending off its first shipment of rice for this year to Venezuela on May 23 and its first shipment of paddy on May 28, according to Minister Ramsammy.

He has just returned from a trip to Venezuela where he finalized the arrangements under the 2013 rice agreement between the two South American neighbours.
During an interview with  Guyana Chronicle yesterday at his Regent Road, Georgetown office, Dr. Ramsammy said that during his recent visit to Venezuela, he was able to amend the agreement so that now more rice than paddy will be exported to Venezuela. He said that this will allow for more jobs in Guyana because the paddy will be processed into rice locally, rather than being shipped as paddy to be processed in Venezuela.
Since the beginning of the arrangement in 2009 with Venezuela, currently the largest importer of Guyana’s rice, it was hoped to export more rice than paddy. Dr. Ramsammy said, however, that the opposite was done, and the agreement entered into on May 3 reflected that regime of more paddy than rice.
On May 3, Minister Ramsammy and Venezuelan Minister of Food, Felix Osorio signed a Letter of Commitment for the shipment of 210,000 tonnes of rice, in the form of 140,000 tonnes of paddy and 70,000 tonnes of white rice.
However, the minister has disclosed that as opposed to the previous 70,000 tonnes of white rice, 110,000 tonnes will now be exported, in addition to 81,000 tonnes of paddy as opposed to the previous 140,000 tonnes.
He also related that Guyana was able to negotiate the retention of the same prices as under last year’s agreement.
The minister further revealed that the overall total which will be earned by Guyana through the exports have increased slightly. The previous arrangement would have earned the country some US$130M, while approximately US $134.5M will now be earned.
He said that it is expected that in excess of 100,000 tonnes of rice and paddy will be shipped between now and July this year.
However, he noted that one challenge faced by the industry is the size of vessels used to ship the rice, which allow a maximum 5,500 tonnes to be shipped on one occasion on each vessel. He said that the ministry is now examining ways of improving this.
“So it’s not an issue of whether we have enough to ship, we have more than enough to ship. But it’s an issue of how rapidly we can get it sent off,” he said.