The Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo) has been unable to meet its first crop production target of 33,863 tonnes, falling short by 332 tonnes of sugar.
According to figures released to Sunday Stabroek by GuySuCo’s Corporate Communications Manager Audreyanna Thomas, GuySuCo managed to produce 33,531 tonnes of sugar.
In May, it was reported that the Albion Estate had produced 15,462 tonnes of sugar out of its target of 18,511 tonnes, while the Blairmont Estate had produced 8,879 tonnes of sugar, surpassing its target of 7,955 tonnes of sugar. For the Uitvlugt Estate then, 7,397 tonnes of sugar had been produced, surpassing its target of 6,564 tonnes of sugar, which had set the sugar company on a path to achieve its overall production target for the first crop.
Thomas also pointed out that the worker attendance for the first crop averaged 61% across the industry, with the Blairmont and Uitvlugt Estates recording 62% attendance at each, while Albion Estate recorded a 60% attendance record.
GuySuCo’s second crop target is currently set at 73,160 tonnes of sugar.
For the first crop last year, the sugar company had produced 34,450 tonnes of sugar, failing to meet its target of 36,105 tonnes of sugar, which was the lowest ever first crop for the industry in the last two years.
For 2017, GuySuCo had fallen short of a projected figure for the first crop by some 24,566 tonnes of sugar, as it was only able to produce 49,606 tonnes out of a projected 74,172 tonnes of sugar.
In 2016, the sugar company also fell short of its first crop target of 80,270 tonnes of sugar and was only able to produce 56,825 tonnes.
For the previous year, GuySuCo’s production had fallen below its first crop target of 86,201 tonnes as they were only able to produce 81,194 tonnes of sugar, approximately 5,000 tonnes below the target. However, 2015’s figure was an increase over the previous year’s first crop production of 75,000 tonnes of sugar.
