Dear Editor,
I commend the letter (Sep 6) critiquing SN editorial (Sep 3) that describes GuySuCo as a ward of the state. GuySuCo provides a livelihood to some 100,000 people or one-eighth of the country’s population. The state can’t allow it to go under simply because of the number of people who depend on it.

The editorial fails to note that one of the reasons for the sorry state of affairs of GuySuCo is the failure to decommission the factories of the shuttered estates by the preceding APNU regime. This resulted in destruction of the factories, making it difficult to get them back in operation. Wales was cannibalised. The factories and offices were overrun with thick bushes and the land forested vegetation with drains and trenches silted up; grass was growing out of buildings and the factories. It has been a total mess to clean up, costing billions.

Weather has had a deleterious effect on production – cultivation as well as harvesting and grinding. Rainfall has been incessant, reducing planting and harvesting days.

Sugar production is labour intensive. There has been a shortage of labour with a turnout rate of about 50 per cent. Sugar cultivation and harvesting have been back-breaking work. People are moving away from sugar because of the hard work and low pay. Few countries utilise manual labour for sugar production. I had previously suggested that we should import sugar workers from India and/or Thailand, two of the largest producers of cane sugar with both having a surplus of labourers.

Another flaw in the editorial is its failure to note that of the near $21B allocated to GuySuCo over [the] last two years, over half — $11B — was spent on rehabilitating the estates and billions more on equipment. It is not that the money went to pay wages.

Sugar workers deserve higher wages. They must have a livable wage to stay in the industry. You can’t pay unsatisfactory wage and expect the sugar or any state enterprise to turn around. Workers will not give their full ability to produce unless their salary is fair and equivalent to their labour. One must not see salary in a state-owned entity from a totally capitalist eye but as a development strategy of the industry. If the salary is below that of other similar jobs, workers will leave and accept other jobs. Right now, there is a shortage of labour.  GuySuCo is struggling to retain workers with a turnout of just 50 per cent. Unless there is a livable wage, more workers will leave for higher income elsewhere. Sugar workers toil under hot sun or rain utilising dangerous tools at great risk of injury; they are not cleaning government office or school buildings protected from the elements. And when factory not grinding, workers get a small stipend that can’t buy food for the week. Other state workers are guaranteed a minimum income that qualifies them for NIS; not all sugar workers receive that benefit.

It is noted that while cost of living has been steadily increasing from 2015, when other workers were getting hot increases, sugar workers were denied increases during the five years under the Coalition. So their real wages declined considerably as income for others went up and as inflation ballooned out of control. The increase they received since August 2020 has not made up for the loss of real income from 2015. There must be a differential make up for what they didn’t get during the five years of Coalition governance – at least 25 per cent that was given to others.

How does one justify increased wages when GuySuCo is losing billions? In the short run, it would increase cost of production which can be mitigated by reducing management costs. In the long run, productivity will increase gradually narrowing the gap between operational costs and revenues. To increase pay for field workers, including cane cutters, other expenses should be trimmed. Another option is for sugar workers to be offered land (say 10 acres) to grow cane which is then sold to the factories similar to private cane farming, a pattern somewhat akin to rice production by small rice growers who sell their paddy to the millers. Estate productivity always lagged behind private cane farmers. Private cane farming was very profitable when factories were in operation; the farmers and the factories earned a lot of money when both were function[ing] efficiently.

Investment in GuySuCo is worth it. To allow it to go under will cause severe social dislocation costing government more money to address ills. Government is also funding development cost for housing, utilities, infrastructure, and several other industries? Why pick on GuySuCo?

Yours truly,
Vishnu Bisram