– GRDB corrects claims made by Surinamese ambassador

THE Guyana Rice Development Board (GRDB) has rejected statements from Suriname’s De Ware Tijd Dwtonline which quoted Suriname’s Ambassador to Guyana, Ebu Jones, as saying that an insect plague has broken out in the local rice sector.

GRDB, in a press statement, noted that some farmers’ fields in Region Six (East Berbice-Corentyne) were affected by paddy bugs during the first crop of 2019.
“Those paddy bug incidences were dealt with by farmers.  Paddy bugs are pests that affect paddy production globally,” said the GRDB.

GRDB General Manager, Nizam Hassan, said Ambassador Jones probably took information from the media which might not have been wholly correct.

“Saying something like there is an insect plague in the rice sector could affect our market, so we wanted to clear the air on this matter,” said Hassan in an invited comment on Saturday.

In April, the Council of the Central Corentyne Chamber said it is expected that approximately 20 per cent of the entire crop of 58,200 acres in Region Six would be ravaged by paddy bugs.

Hassan, however, debunked those claims, noting that the situation is not so bad and that the board of the GRDB has been working assiduously with farmers to find a way to manage the situation.

“In order to manage the infestation, farmers need to follow the guidelines provided by the GRDB,” he said.

In order to further clear the air, GRDB said 98 per cent of the first crop has been harvested at the end of May 2019, producing 519,470 tonnes of paddy at an average yield of six tonnes per hectare, compared to 508,195 tonnes for the first crop of 2018.
The figure is a clear indication that despite the challenges in the industry, the sector continues to perform well.
Meanwhile, Dwtonline also quoted Ambassador Jones as saying that paddy is smuggled from Guyana to Suriname.

The board, in response, said it is unaware of any smuggling of paddy to Suriname.  In fact, rice has been and is being exported to Suriname legally.
“We checked with officers and with our staff and we did not get any information that paddy is being smuggled to Suriname… I don’t know why the ambassador would say that,” said Hassan.

GRDB presented figures which showed that for the period 2014-2018, some 3,535 tonnes of rice and rice by-products were exported to Suriname.
In 2018, 233 tonnes were exported, and as at May 2019, 98 tonnes of parboiled rice was exported.

Overall exports for the first quarter of 2019 were 103,024 tonnes, compared to 49,629 tonnes for the corresponding period last year.

“The board noted that despite challenges, the rice industry has been resilient and is dealing with the challenges as they present themselves,” said GRDB.