Dear Editor,
Despite what Guysuco’s Cane Farming Manager, Mr. Walter Persaud wrote in his missive published in Stabroek News’, letter column of April 22, 2015, “All private cane farmers treated alike,” the following information below in this letter will help expose his attempt to mislead the Minister and the public.
It appears that Guysuco’s management have a two-tier system in place for cane farmers.
1) Low Interest Agri-Loans must be available, to all cane farmers and Co-op Societies.
– It was reported a few years ago, that some private cane farmers in Berbice, got access to
agri-loans with a 7% interest from a private commercial bank due to some arrangement by
the President, Ministry of Agriculture, Guysuco and the bank.
-This bank was offered tax exemption on the interest earned on these loans.
Mr. B. Balkarran and other cane farmers from West Bank Demerara have made numerous representation to get the same low interest agri-loan of 7%, that was offered to the Berbice cane farmers. One such meeting was held at Guysuco’s Head Office with Mr. Bhim, Mr. Rajnarine, Mr. Walter Persaud, the Wales Estate Manager and several cane farmers including myself. We requested that Guysuco and the bank make a similar agreement to grant Belle Vue Co-op and the Demerara cane farmers the same low interest of 7%. Mr. Persaud told us that it was a one -time offer that they gave the Berbice cane farmers and that this offer was not available for Demerara farmers. I told him this was not fair and that the Demerara cane farmers should get the same one-time offer of 7% interest too. He told us to go and talk to the Minister of Agriculture.
2) The Ministry of Agriculture is ignoring Demerara Cane Farmers and appears to be stalling on the process, to allow them to elect their representatives to the National Cane Farmers Committee (NCFC) and the Sugar Industry Labour Welfare Fund (SILWF).
The present chairman and secretary of NCFC, are based in Berbice and the farmers in Demerara are finding it very difficult to contact and or meet with them.
-Every Sugar Estate should have a functional cane Farmers Liaison Committee.
-All Cane Farmers and/or the Liaison Committee from each estate must and should be allowed to nominate and elect their representatives to be in the NCFC and SILWF.
3) Guysuco discriminated on leases offered to farmers. During 1990-2009, Guysuco and the Wales Estate Manager agreed and gave Mr. Deodat, a private contractor, approximately 500 acres of land, with a fifty years lease, in Red Wing Polder, Canal# 2. (It was in the press and on CNS TV6). Mr. Walter, must tell us, who was the field manager at Wales Estate during the1990s.
During this same period, Guysuco and Wales Estate Managers, were refusing to renew the Belle Vue Cane Famers Marketing Co-op Society’s Reg# 967 lease.
After Mr. B. Balkarran and the society’s committee of management made numerous representations for the renewal and longer-term lease, Guysuco renewed Belle Vue’s co-op lease for only 5 years, (we have a copy of this 5 years lease as proof), compared to the 50-year lease given to the private contractor.
It appears the 5 years lease was a ploy to make Belle Vue co-op fail.
All the financial institutions in Guyana required the co-op to have at least a 20-year lease, before they would consider offering any loan. Surely the five-year lease granted to Belle Vue farmers would have mitigated against them receiving any loan October –December 2009: Mr. B. Balkarran, Belle Vue Co-op representatives, the Minister of Agriculture, Minister Robert Persaud, Mr. Bhim and Wales Estate manager Mr.Shubby and Mr. Cummings, had a joint meeting at the Ministry of Agriculture. At this meeting, Mr. B. Balkarran submitted the Belle Vue Co-op’s five-year investment and development plan, with a proposed funding for G$40m. During this meeting, it was agreed that Guysuco would give Belle Vue Co-op Society a new 25 years collective lease; a copy of the Survey plan of the cultivation and a Guysuco letter of no- objection for the co-op to use this new lease to obtain an agri-loan for co-op development work. Since December 2009 we have been trying and waiting to get these documents and the situation remains the same to date. So yet again the Belle Vue Co-op and the farmers were stymied from pursuing any loans for rehabilitation and development.
4) Guysuco and the Ministry of Agriculture revolving loan. (See 2011-Oct-13 K.News) Members of the Belle Vue Co-op applied on three separate occasion, for this NCFC revolving loan of G$200,000.00 per farmer, to do ploughing, planting, etc. Mr. B. Balkarran assisted some of these farmers to fill and submit these signed applications to the co-op society management committee, Ministry of Labour, CCDO, NCFC. To date no farmer from Belle Vue Co-op receive this loan nor even an acknowledgement for their application.
5) Wales Estate Management refused to honour the Belle Vue lease contract and withheld their service to clean and excavate the Belle Vue drainage trench for over 23 years, (Maravian Dam trench). Based on the Belle Vue lease contract between Guysuco and the Belle Vue Co-op, Wales Estate is supposed to maintain all the external drainage canals; supply water for irrigation and navigation (transportation of cane to factory), while the co-op is responsible for all internal drains.
I mean no disrespect to the Minister or the Government. But the facts are the facts.
I hope the above information will help to show the two-tier system that Guysuco is using with the cane farmers so that the Minister of Agriculture will intervene as soon as possible to forge a national plan with cane farmers and sugar workers’ involvement.
For Mr. Walter Persaud’s information and others in Guysuco, Mr. Balram Balkarran grew up in Belle Vue from the inception and was involved in Belle Vue cane farming since in the 1960s.
Yours faithfully,
B. Balkarran
