–weekly production target surpassed by 7.9 per cent

THE Albion Sugar Estate, Region Six (East Berbice-Corentyne), was able to leverage improved cane quality, better harvester attendance and enhanced productivity in the fields to surpass its target for the week ending March 19, 2022.
According to a press statement from the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo), the Albion/Port Mourant Estate exceeded its weekly target by 7.9 per cent; this was the first weekly target surpassed for the year 2022 in the sugar sector.
The estate was able to surpass its target despite being obstructed by intermittent rainfall, which has stalled mechanical harvesting operations.
“As a result of this achievement, qualified employees who worked 80 per cent or more days available for the week, will benefit from an additional day’s pay (tax free),” GuySuCo related.
The sugar corporation at the commencement of the first crop of 2022, introduced an improved Personal Performance Incentive (PPI) Scheme, which saw cane harvesters responding positively to this incentive by improving on attendance and productivity.
This PPI “handsomely rewards” each worker progressively as they improve their productivity, with some workers adding more than G$15,000 to their weekly pay.
GuySuCo has also implemented a similar incentive scheme for the planters, fertilising crew and chemical weed control workers.
“I want to thank management and workers for achieving this weekly production incentive. With this, we will have more money for our families and I would like to encourage all workers to come out and let us achieve more weekly targets in the future at Albion Estate,” cane harvester, Omadat Seecharan was quoted as saying.
Weekly Production Incentive (WPI) is one of several initiatives in place to boost employees’ productivity and was implemented on May 13, 1989.
The payment of a WPI is based on the individual estate’s achievement of 100 per cent or more of its weekly sugar production target.
Once the targets are achieved, employees on the estate receive one additional day’s pay. If the estate’s achievement is 130 per cent or more of its target, then employees on the estate will receive two days’ pay.
It was reported recently that after five years of labouring in the fields and factories within Guyana’s sugar industry without an increase in remuneration, or other incentives to acknowledge their hard work, sugar workers benefitted from a seven per cent increase in wages and salaries last year.
The approval of this increase by the government was a welcome reward for sugar workers, whose relentless efforts to acquire such a provision under the previous A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) administration proved futile.
Contrary to the government’s move, which was to the benefit of workers, Vice-President Bharrat Jagdeo, in announcing the initiative, said that the former coalition administration had shuttered several estates, and left workers on the breadline.
In 2017, the APNU+AFC Government had announced the closure of several sugar estates across the country, leaving thousands of persons without jobs or sources of income. The move saw four sugar estates being closed, and 7,000 sugar workers losing their jobs.
“Under APNU [+AFC], 7,000 sugar workers lost their jobs, and in the five years, there was no salary increase for sugar workers… Apart from that, the Annual Production Incentive (API) had also been terminated. So, while the rest of the country got salary increases, they got zero.
And, in fact, many of them lost their jobs, so the $250,000 grant was a way to alleviate some of the issues they faced; it is almost reparative justice, and we had to give a salary increase this year. We had said that whatever the public servants get, they would also get… We decided that seven per cent would also be awarded to sugar worker,” Vice-President Jagdeo said.