As he announced that rehiring of sugar workers at Rose Hall estate began yesterday, President Irfaan Ali said government is now focused on redeveloping farmlands in order to deliver on its campaign promise to reopen shuttered estates since the former administration left the industry in ruins.
During his bid to be elected, Ali said the PPP/C would reopen the sugar estates that were closed by the APNU+AFC, which saw the retrenchment of thousands of workers.
In an interview yesterday with Stabroek News via Zoom, Ali was asked about the progress that has been made and he said he believed that there has been “tremendous progress” during his government’s 51 days in office. He was happy to inform that “today rehiring has commenced at Rose Hall” and that he had held a meeting with technical staff of GuySuCo to discuss the revitalising of the sector and where investments should be channeled.
But he bemoaned the state of the corporation which he inherited, saying that most of the assets were gone and there was no finances to show for them. “Everything has been destroyed. I don’t know what kind of hurricane passed through those factories and those fields. Everything has been destroyed and we now have to work on rebuilding the fields because it makes no sense to have a factory ready and you don’t have no canes for the factory. So there is a plan now, in terms of field preparation and looking at the agriculture aspect of the sugar industry,” he said.
“Simultaneously, there is a team looking at the factories. Can you imagine that GuySuCo don’t have more than two vehicles at the moment? They don’t have more than two working tractors. This is what took place in the last five years. They don’t have any vehicles. We have to rebuild from the scratch. From the basic things we have to start with,” he added.
Earlier this month, Ali had announced that $5 billion will be injected into the beleaguered corporation as the new PPP/C government moves to deliver on its campaign promise of reopening three of the sugar estates that were shuttered under the former APNU+AFC-led government.
During the consideration of the estimates in the sitting of the Committee of Supply yesterday, Minister of Agriculture Zulfikar Mustapha said that $3 billion would be dedicated to the recapitalization of all of the estates.
Ali was asked how many sugar workers are expected to be reemployed in the short term. He said that he did not have the information at hand since his office “deals with the overarching policy” and the minister responsible would have statistics and other figures readily available.
“The short term plan from a policy perspective is to get back these estates operable, to make them a going concern as quickly as possible. To do that, the first set of investment that is required is land preparation and agricultural development because you have to get back the canes in the fields to feed the plants,” he said.
“To get the canes in the fields, you have to get the seedlings which we don’t have now. So basically we are starting from scratch. In the short term, it will take us maybe just about a year of agriculture work and land preparation to get enough cane to feed. The first order of business is to get the canes in the fields and then we work simultaneously to fix the factories so that when the factories are ready the cane is ready and there is no lapse,” he added.
‘Political will’
Ali stressed that despite the dire situation faced by GuySuCo, he is determined that the estates will be brought back to a standard that would be attractive for investors. “Let me say this – the political will and the commitment has not diminished by one iota. It has been strengthened because we are going to invest in the industry. We are going to create, bring back those jobs, bring back economic life and livelihood to those communities,” he stressed.
The Wales Sugar Estate, which was first of the four estates to be closed by the former government, will see direct financial assistance given to families since that estate no longer has the potential to produce sugar.
But a development plan would see sacked employees given lands to develop as part of a business hub is in the works.
“Wales, for example, everything is gone there. The entire factory is gone; sold out as scrap mental. So we are looking at the putting together of a Wales Development Authority that would look at Wales as a business incubation centre; as a centre for diversification. Special incentives will be given there for investment in manufacturing, agro processing, agro packaging, agricultural diversification and emphasis being placed on those employees who lost their jobs there that cannot be replaced, that they are given an opportunity also to own lands and be part of this investment. That entire area would become a business incubation and development hub,” Ali said.
“Uitvlugt, on the other hand, what we are looking to do also is to explore all the possibilities for the sugar industry. So while we are bringing back the sugar industry to a going concern or making them operable, we are also not excluding [investment] options in the future. Because if we make them operable and bring them back as a going concerns, then of course the value goes up to where they are now. So we are going to explore having private interests, public-private partnerships in these estates so that we can move towards more value-added, get back the packaging going. [We are ] looking at private investors who might be willing to fund a refinery, take up the operational costs and have a profit share with us; that is another option. So we are exploring all possibilities,” he added.
In their present state, Ali said, the shuttered estates have “nothing to bring to the table”.
“Going through the files when they were going concerns, there were a lot of interests at that time but private took into consideration what took place over the past five years; the destruction of the place. We are looking at all the variables to ensure we have an industry that is sustainable and one that eventually will be very operable,” he said.
Asked if returning them to going concerns meant possibly selling, he replied, “I didn’t say they will go on sale. It is to take the value up. When you have the value up, you have an asset that gives you greater leverage for investments. You can go for a private public investment or go for a blend that incorporates financing or technical expertise,” he explained.
“In relation to what is on the table now, nothing is on the table. There is at one time an expression of interest which would have expired so we will have to go out back though a public process, to have either those interests reviewed or to send in new interest also,” he added.
Under the APNU+AFC, the National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited (NICIL) took over the divestment and privatisation of assets for GuySuCo but none of its deals have been made public and the sugar corporation repeatedly bemoaned that it was “in the dark” as it pertains to deals made.
