President David Granger yesterday said that the ongoing protests by rice farmers may be politically motivated and his government is being wrongly blamed for paddy farmers not being paid.
“There are elements instigating protest to create the illusion that the government is at fault. The government did not buy paddy,” Granger said at his first press conference since assuming office over four months ago. According to him, efforts are afoot to find markets abroad for the rice being produced.
“We are searching for markets to help the private farmers and millers. We want the industry to survive and prosper. But you must look at the internal dynamics of the industry and you will discover that it is a miller/farmer problem and not a government/ rice problem,” the president asserted.
For weeks, there have been countrywide protests by rice farmers who are demanding that they be paid large sums owed to them by millers. Farmers in Essequibo have said that collectively, they are owned tens of millions of dollars.
Asked yesterday to respond to the protests by rice farmers, Granger said his information is that farmers sell their paddy to millers who, in turn, produce rice which they try to market.
“It is a private arrangement. Farmer, miller, market. It is not a government arrangement and without making any accusations, sometimes the millers receive payment for their rice but don’t pay for the paddy,” he said.
Granger said there are problems within the rice industry which should not be blamed on the government. “It is a private enterprise largely,” he asserted.
He disclosed that during his recent trip to the US, he met and held discussions with the president of Senegal. “I am looking for markets for rice. I said that the main focus of Guyana’s Foreign Affairs Ministry is economic diplomacy. I want to sell rice. I want to sell rum…plantain chips…but as far as this protest is concerned, it is misplaced. The paddy farmers should be protesting against the people who owe them money. We don’t owe them any money,” he said.
On September 11, scores of rice farmers marched in front of the Ministry of Agriculture, then in front of the Ministry of the Presidency, holding placards.
General Secretary of the Rice Producers Association (RPA) Dharamkumar Seeraj, who led the protestors, proclaimed that the rice industry was in a tremendous crisis which will worsen if important issues are not urgently addressed by the authorities. The farmers called on the government to fulfill the promises made to them. In addition to the large sums of money owed, the farmers are not in favour of the price paid for their paddy. A bag of paddy is bought for about $1,800 and farmers feel this is unreasonable given the amount of money that has to be pumped into each crop.
