SUGAR workers whose services were terminated under the previous APNU-AFC regime will benefit from a $1.8B package. The announcement was made by Vice-President, Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo, during a recent meeting with sugar workers at Skeldon, East Berbice. According to the Vice-President, each retrenched sugar worker will receive an additional $250,000 on their severance payment, expected to be made by January 2022.

This is music to the ears of sugar workers whose services were unceremoniously and callously terminated by the previous APNU-AFC administration. The workers were pushed into the breadline without any form of relief by the then administration. Many were forced to live on charity and handouts. The social and economic fallout from the closure of functioning sugar estates was monumental and spoke volumes of the anti-working class and vindictive nature of the David Granger regime.

This gesture by the PPP/C administration was welcomed by sugar workers and their representative union, the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers’ Union (GAWU). Sugar workers for decades have subsidised the economy by working for low wages under harsh conditions. Under the PNC regime, a significant proportion of the revenues from sugar was sliced off to meet government spending leaving very little for the payment of wages and salaries. Factories and other capital equipment were allowed to deteriorate as the then administration literally squeezed the juice out of the industry in order to finance their lavish and extravagant lifestyles.

It was not until the PPP/C came to power in October 1992 that the levy on sugar was withdrawn and a lifeline thrown to the industry. Sugar production increased steadily and the workers were paid better wages despite challenges faced by the industry including a precipitate decline of the price of sugar following the termination of subsidies enjoyed under the European Union preferential market price for sugar.

When the APNU+AFC assumed power in May 2015, it closed down four grinding sugar estates including the Skeldon Estate which was modernised by the PPP/C administration in order to produce sugar at lower unit cost and to become more competitive on the world market. Despite some initial hiccups and technical glitches, the Skeldon Factory was beginning to pick up momentum before the Granger administration took a decision to close it down along with three others including Rose Hall, Enmore and Wales. The then government closed down the factories even as a technical committee set up by the administration advised against the closure of the estates.

It is a known fact that sugar workers are in the main supporters of the PPP/C and it is widely believed that the decision to close the estates had more to do with politics and less with economics. Despite the mismanagement of the industry by the then APNU+AFC administration and the vindictive policies toward sugar workers, the industry was still viable and contributing significantly to the economic and social life of the country. Thousands of workers were employed in the industry, not to mention the accelerator effect such employment generated at the community level.

Thankfully, the PPP/C administration is now in the process of bringing back to life the shuttered estates and already hundreds of retrenched sugar workers have gained re-employment. And while it is a fact that the contribution of sugar to the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is not as substantial as in past years, there can be no doubt that the industry still has tremendous potential to add value to the transformation process currently underway especially in the context of our emerging oil and gas economy. Sugar production, and the agriculture sector as a whole, is one sure way to avoid what is commonly referred to as the ‘Dutch Disease’ as it remains a strong pillar of our diversified economy.

The decision to pay sugar workers the $250,000 in addition to their severance pay is consistent with the pro-poor and pro-working class character of the Dr. Irfaan Ali-led PPP/C administration. More significantly, it is an attempt at correcting an act of injustice meted out to sugar workers by the uncaring and vindictive policies of the previous David Granger administration.