Despite longstanding suspicions, Minister of Agriculture Dr Leslie Ramsammy has said Guyana must embrace the cooperative movement, arguing that it is crucial to achieving long-term sugar production targets while ensuring the country’s food security.
In his message to mark the United Nations’ International Year of Cooperatives last Wednesday, the minister acknowledged that the country has a long history of cooperatives that have not always brought the expected success, leading to suspicion and distrust. Ramsammy blamed the mismanagement of 1970s and 1980s for leaving “a trail of stigma” that he said must be addressed, although there have been some good co-ops that have changed lives and communities.
He said that the scepticism that is attached to local co-ops stems from the attempts after Independence to adopt an economic model that established co-ops at the centre of Guyana’s development but used them as “tools to execute certain economic of political functions on behalf of the government, not as autonomous, member-based organisations that create and consolidate self-employment.”
Since then, government policies towards cooperatives have changed. In addition to the good quality co-op, the Kuru Kuru Coop College established in the 1970, more recently, he noted, a group of women interested in mangrove restoration established a coop that now operates a company that processes and packages pepper and other condiments for sale. There are also now more opportunities for coops to succeed in the agriculture sector: in cash crop, rice and sugar cultivation and fishing; as well as in the housing and credit unions, he added.
According to Ramsammy, one of the largest economic investments made is the modernization of the Skeldon Sugar Factory, which will allow private farmers, particularly those in co-ops, to contribute to the more than 1.6M tonnes of sugar cane needed to fully utilise the factory. “It is our intention to produce 400,000 tons of sugar by 2015. But GuySuCo will not be able to grow and produce the 4.5M tonnes of sugar cane required for the production of so much sugar,” he said, adding that it will rely on private farmers and co-ops to produce about 1.5M to 2M tonnes of sugar cane each year.
He said too that he is anticipating that the private sector can contribute at least 30% of the sugar cane produced locally; sourcing a large percentage of this amount from cane farming co-ops. “I believe the opportunity has grown for co-ops in Guyana for rice farming coops and cattle-based co-ops and co-ops for fishing,” he said.
The minister also noted that in 1990s the nation consumed less than 200,000 kg of beef every year. In 2003, it consumed 900,000kgs of beef and last year it consumed 2.4M kgs of beef.
It has been projected that Guyana would consume about 3.5M kg of beef by 2015 and it simply does not have a supply of beef to meet these internal demands at this time. “This provides another opportunity for people,” Ramsammy said, adding that the demand for swine is even greater.
Ramsammy also said that in 2011, Guyana exported 11,000 tonnes of cash crops and it has market for much more this year. Last year, 2,000 tons of condiments were exported and more than 500,000 kg of aquaculture fish produced and 30,000 tonnes of marine fish. He noted that these numbers are far below the amount needed to meet local consumption and to satisfy the export market and as such cooperatives can capitalise on the opportunities to do so.
During activities for the International Year of Cooperatives, “the voice of the cooperative movement will be important in calling for new frameworks for inclusive growth,” Ramsammy noted. He stated that Guyana should not turn its back on cooperativism; instead, he said, it must commit to creating a dynamic cooperative movement that embraces the best practices that abound countrywide and in the wider world.
