Dear Editor,
I have been following up your coverage of the performance of the Skeldon Sugar Factory and the commentaries from your readers. Here is my observation. Blaming the Chinese for bad construction and so forth is a tired excuse for failed or inept local management. When sugar was under Bookers, things went usually smoothly because the operation – from field to factory – was properly managed.
You could have the best technology in the world but without proper management, it will not deliver. In 1976, the same Chinese built a 1,060-mile railway linking Zambia and Tanzania to its port of Dar as Salaam – a major feat of engineering – from land surveying all the way to laying the tracks for the locomotives. China provided lots of assistance, both money and labour. The Tan-Zam railway has since fallen into disrepair.
Yours faithfully,
T. Yhip
Canada