MINISTER of Agriculture Zulfikar Mustapha has announced that the rice industry’s target for the first crop of this year has already been surpassed, marking a strong start toward meeting the overall national goal of 824,000 tonnes for 2025.

During a recent outreach to Berbice, Minister Mustapha shared the positive update, citing improvements across multiple areas of the rice sector as contributing factors.
“When I look at the crop I’m very heartened to say we’ve already surpassed the target for the first crop and this came about because of a number of factors. Leaving out the system itself, we have better variety we have developed up from GRDB; we have better crop husbandry, and also the system has been working overtime,” the minister said.
Despite ongoing challenges from heavy rainfall, Mustapha confirmed that most of the crop has already been harvested.

“We have been able to drain the land, to get the harvest out, and we are close to about 95 – 97 percent completed already,” he said.
He expressed optimism that the remaining harvest would be completed soon, contributing even further to the overall total.

“This came about because of the infrastructure work… we have more pumps in place, we have sluices them working, and we have better variety of paddy and our extension officers have been working with farmers to implement best practices,” Mustapha added.

The Agriculture Minister’s remarks reflect ongoing efforts by the government to boost rice production through improved infrastructure, support services, and other advancements.