Barama Company Limited is set to reopen its Land of Canaan operation next month and efforts are to be made by the government to monitor production levels to ensure that this will surpass what had obtained before the closure.
To ensure that transparency and openness is maintained, government has commenced discussions with Barama’s management to re-visit the company’s original investment agreement, a Govern-ment Information Agency (GINA) release stated.
On Wednesday, Agricul-ture Minister Robert Persaud inspected the Land of Canaan operation which had been closed for six months following what the company said was irreparable damage to a boiler.
According to GINA, Persaud said that these discussions, which are expected to pave the way for changes in the company’s investment agreement, will be finalized shortly.
This will see the size of forestry areas, the type of operations, benefits and the type of royalty paid reviewed.
However, the majority of the company’s upstream production will be done at its Buckhall location while the Land of Canaan factory will only be dealing with the downstream aspect of plywood manufacturing.
The company is currently looking at a production of 2,400 cubic meters per month at the Land of Canaan operation.
Corporate Affairs and Forest Planning head of the company, Mohindra Chand, was quoted by GINA as saying, “Since the incident in October we have been working assiduously in the restart of the company. We are confident that we will meet that deadline and we also want to thank the government for their support and guidance through the way.”
Barama has managed to overcome challenges to an extreme level and assured that plywood will again be on the local and export markets, Chand stated.
When the company closed its operation back in October, 274 workers were laid off. With intervention by President Jagdeo, some were trained in Information Communication and given financial support.
Currently Barama is in the process of rehiring some of those workers. An advertisement in the March 8 edition of Kaieteur News called for “former and new employees to work at the Ply Sheet Factory (Barama), Land of Canaan” to re-apply for work.
Meanwhile, Barama is seeking clarification on the government’s description of the integrated approach as a “New Company” and “operating under a new dimension” as cause for concern for the operating framework of the company.
Apparently, Persaud was quoted as saying this in other media. However, a release issued on Thursday stated, “While we acknowledge that these discussions are ongoing, at this juncture we wish to reiterate that our integrated approach to normalize the plywood production has not resulted in any change or deviation from our business perspective as set out by our formal commitments to the Guyanese nation.”
The release did confirm that the company is in discussion with the government “on matters of interest pertaining to our formal instruments of engagement.”
The release also noted that the objectives of the company’s Plywood Restoration Plans “are to enhance the efficiency and productivity of our plywood manufacturing processes under an integrated approach without compromising our commitment… necessitated by the need to expedite [these plans] in the most cost effective manner in order to minimize the impact of the fallout.”
