Across the country, hundreds of farmers looked on helplessly as rains over the last week swamped their rice fields, leaving more than 35,000 acres, about 20% of the current crop, affected at varying degrees.
The heavy rainfall started mid last week and has left some fields covered in as much as two feet of water. In areas like Cane Grove (Region Four) and the Essequibo Coast (Region Two), hundreds of farmers are forced to stand by and watch as their plants begin to rot.
Water, farmers told Stabroek News yesterday, has been on the land for as long as a week in some cases. Even those whose fields have not been swamped are “feeling the pressure,” because the current La Nina conditions are preventing them from commencing harvesting.
With another four to five days of rain expected, farmers are not optimistic that the situation will get better soon. Many have already calculated that they will lose more than 25% of their crop and expect a lower yield.
General Secretary of the Guyana Rice Producers’ Association (GRPA) Dharamkumar Seeraj told Stabroek News yesterday that 20,000 acres, three quarters of which is ready to be harvested, have been affected in Essequibo. Seeraj explained that just over 32, 000 acres were cultivated in Essequibo this crop.
In Region Three, he reported, about 10, 000 acres have been affected by the rainfall. More than 3,000 acres of this was ready for harvesting. Seeraj said that Region Six is the least affected because it usually started cultivation late. The crop in that region, he explained, is not at the stage where the field needs to be drained of the water.
There is more than six inches of water in some locations and as much as 48 inches in others. Seeraj said that some plants have been in water for a week-and-a-half going. Farmers, according to him, are already beginning to see the losses as the stems of some plants have started to weaken, causing the plants to fall. “The plants which are ready to be harvested that are still under water will be heavily damaged if the water does not begin to move off by weekend,” Seeraj said. “Even those plants which are not ready to be harvested will be affected…being under water for so many days will decrease their yielding capacity,” he explained.
The GRPA has not yet been able to estimate the current losses being suffered by farmers, Seeraj added, but it is definite that “some rice will be lost.”
This crop, Seeraj noted, there was already an approximate 20% increase in price for a bag of paddy. The current conditions are likely to further increase the price.
Cane Grove
In December 2008, the rice fields in Cane Grove, Mahaica, were covered in inches of water, following heavy rainfall. These conditions continued into January 2009 and hundreds of acres were damaged.
Many farmers in the Cane Grove area were forced to take loans from banks and other private sector organisations to invest in the second crop of 2009. Without the loans, Hemchand Singh told Stabroek News yesterday, he would not have been able to replant another crop after the devastation during that period.
Over the last seven days, he said, about 4,000 of the 5,000 acres of rice in Cane Grove have been under water. Singh planted 12 acres this crop and all his fields are under about two feet of water. “My paddy was ripe…I de just waiting to start harvesting but look what happening now,” Singh said.
The man explained that already many of the plants in his fields are beginning to rot in the water. With the rainfall expected to continue until well into the weekend, he said, there is hardly any hope left for any of his crop. “Even when de rain stop fall de water going to lef’ on de land and it going to take anywhere around two weeks for the water to pump out and even after de water gone, I still gon can’t carry combine in the field,” Singh said.
Cultivating rice is his livelihood, the man further said, and without it he is not sure how he will get the money to pay his loans or put food on the table. The lenders, Singh noted, will be willing to extend his payback time but he will have to figure out where the money will come from to reinvest in another crop.
Narine Lall and Ramdat Mangra are facing similar problems. Lall and Mangra have 17 and 9 acres, respectively, under water. Like Singh, both men are very concerned about the financial impact they will suffer due to the current flooding of their fields.
Lall said that in addition to cultivating rice he does other work. However, after the last flooding in 2008/2009, he was forced to dip into his savings heavily to reinvest in another crop.
It has been a struggle, the man said, to keep the last two crops going. “Plenty people think that the last flooding was far away but they got to realise that it was only two crops before this one,” the man said.
Even if he manages to save some of the current crop, Lall explained, the returns from it will not be able to cover his expenses. “This is my main source of income…more than half of my plants already done with,” Mangra told this newspaper yesterday.
He further said that he was not satisfied with works being carried out by the Cane Grove Draining Pump Station. The station was originally equipped with three pumps, other farmers explained, but one has since been moved. Farmers said that the pump was moved for maintenance and only one of the remaining two has been working at any given time in Cane Grove. “You can’t want fix roof when rain ah fall,” one farmer said, adding that, “One pump na doing nothing to pull off de water here.”
It was further noted that due to the high levels of the Mahaica Creek, the kokers in the area will be of no use to the community.
The same problems are being experience in De Hoop, Mahaica and other rice farming communities countrywide.
