Dear Editor,
Rice farmers on the Essequibo Coast had announced a massive picketing exercise, billed for yesterday, starting from Reliance and going to Anna Regina in protest at the non-payment of money owed by millers for paddy. The farmers continually draw attention to the heavy capital investment in fertilizers, ploughs, seed paddy, insecticides, etc, when payment by millers is delayed for months. As such, the economics of the rice sector is dominated by millers.
In addition, there are social prejudices. The greatest source of weakness is in the treatment of small farmers occupying the same living space as the big farmers. Morever, the unsympathetic and sometimes contemptuous tone with regard to small rice farmers contrasts sharply with the respect accorded to big rice farmers in terms of payment for paddy.
Unfortunately for rice interests and for the government as a whole, economic revival will be short lived if this situation of non-payment for farmers’ paddy continues. For the coming years, the rice export situation will be characterized not so much by a cycle of boom and slump, but by a chronic failure by the planners as a consequence of which some crises will be more acute than others. The government therefore has a duty to see that farmers are paid promptly for their produce as a means of promoting stability in the rice sector and reducing its vulnerability to pressures from millers. To this duty, the Ministry of Agriculture should add self-interest, since the farmers’ safety is bound up with the survival of production.
The government must support the rice farmers and must ensure that proper marketing arrangements are made including pricing policies. Efficient arrangements for easy access to credit from banking institutions are in place at a low interest rate. There should be a suitable marketing policy for rice and paddy to ensure that farmers reap the full benefit of their labour and not middlemen. It is expected that the Guyana Rice Development Board will ensure that rice and paddy standards relating to grades, weight, moisture and dockage are adhered to by the millers so farmers can get a fair deal. These include the general conditions for sampling and the methodologies employed for assessing the various factors used in determining the quality of farmers’ paddy.
Yours faithfully,
Mohamed Khan
