TWO or three decades ago, the Guyana economy rested on the tripod of the sugar, bauxite and rice industries. If all three industries functioned very well and could sell their products profitably in the foreign markets, the country experienced a phase of prosperity.  After Independence in 1966, this tripod began to crumble largely because of political involvement in all three industries to the point where all three industries became bankrupt, and the country fell into great economic hardship, resulting in massive emigration of the population who sought refuge in mainly Canada, United States, the Caribbean, Venezuela, Suriname and Brazil.

In Guyana itself, signs of respite came when Democracy again began to be reestablished in the country towards the end of the 1900s. The rice industry was not completely destroyed owing to the self-sacrifice of several farmers and millers who tried to satisfy the local market.

Much of the rice lands were abandoned or turned into grazing lands for livestock or merely allowed to be overgrown when their owners emigrated.  From about 2000, when the attempt was made to resuscitate the industry, it was reminiscent of the early history of the industry.

Rice was first grown in Guyana by escaped slaves in the late 18th century who managed to secure some seed paddy imported from South Carolina in America.  The rice cultivation by the escapees gave away the locations in which they were hiding, and they, therefore, ceased trying to cultivate any more rice.

The Carolina rice that the escaped slaves tried to cultivate was short-grained, and rice cultivation became extinct in Guyana until Indian indentured immigrants introduced the Indian long-grained rice on which the Guyana rice industry is based.

When the early Indian indentured immigrants were imported, a small quantity of rice was imported to feed them, but this was discontinued. Immigrants then tried to grow their own rice along the river banks, and as production increased, it was realised that rice could be a profitable crop.

In the 1860s, a rice company was launched by expatriates, but it did not satisfy its early promise and went out of operation. Several ex-indentured Indians took to small-scale rice farming, and eventually, small mills were established.  By 1900, the Rice Industry was firmly established and had even been able to export rice to the Caribbean islands during World War I.

After 2000, the State began to make a determined input to the industry mainly by legislation protecting the farmers from exploitation by the millers, by the construction of silos and drying platforms to replace drying the grain on the roads and the Guyana Rice Development Board (GRDB) which did and still does a great deal of scientific work to modernise the industry and make it more productive and capable of sustainably serving foreign markets.

Today, there are five drying floors, an efficient seed cleaner and dryer and three laboratories. Rice is responsible for nearly 20 percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and is an important base on which the economy rests.

The Ministry of Agriculture has been further modernising the rice industry to achieve higher production and the highest quality:  Aeroplanes and drones are employed, drainage is continuously under review, and farmers are assisted with other inputs including seeds, fertiliser and sprayers.  Expectedly, production has kept increasing each year; last year it was approximately 653,000 tons.

This year, another milestone was achieved with developing a zinc bio-fortified variety of rice by the GRDB and Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) cooperative effort.

It is important to note that the zinc biofortified rice was developed through conventional farming practices and not through genetic modification, and this was made scientifically easier since rice naturally accumulates higher levels of zinc than usual. Zinc is necessary to properly function human immune systems and fight against infectious diseases such as COVID-19.

Minister of Agriculture, Zulfikar Mustapha, on this theme remarked: “The next goal is to start producing this variety on a large scale so that Guyana can have rice with this food as a healthy supplement.  In this way, we will not only be able to increase the income of our farmers but the health of the consumers including those of the rest of the Caribbean”.

Supporting the same theme, IICA Representative in Guyana, Mr Wilmot Garnett, pointed out that they were developing an adequate information and promotion strategy and that within two to three years, biofortified rice will constitute 50% of Guyana’s total production and that markets have already been secured in Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, Spain and Portugal.

Increased rice production is one of the areas in which Guyana is securing itself against the Dutch disease brought by oil production. It also meets the challenges of climate change as it has greater resilience to adverse weather conditions and is working towards meeting the Caribbean’s food import expenditure of US$5 billion.