Latest update March 29th, 2024 12:59 AM
Sep 22, 2022 Letters
Dear Editor,
Editor, the headline ‘Guysuco in search of cane Farmers’ (K. News August 30th, 2022), can be mis-understood, by many people, not familiar with the way Guysuco and Ministry of Agriculture operates and behave toward cane farmers and sugar workers, especially from Wales Estate. Editor, as a reminder to these ‘so-call smart’, directors, managers from Guysuco and the bureaucrats from the Ministry of Agriculture, that sugar does not produce in Boardroom, but from field and factory.
You know Dr. Cheddi B. Jagan, will normally tell us, that ‘Production and Democracy’ are dialectically connected. That Workers and Farmers Participation in Management will help to boost better workers-managers relation, increase production, productivity and profit for all. If Guysuco and Ministry of Agriculture really want to make Guysuco profitably and to get people into cane farming, they can and should do the following: 1. Re-introduce the joint ‘Workers, Farmers & Managers’ Management Council and Cane Farmers Liaison Committee in each Sugar Estate. 2. These bureaucrats from the Ministry of Agriculture and Guysuco should review and study the concepts and principles of the 1956-Bookers Sugar Estate, and ‘BelleVue Pilot Scheme Sugar Cane Farming Scheme.’ Make more workers into cane farmers, and owners of the means of production. 3. Seek GAWU and NCFC assistance to work along with Guysuco, Ministry of Agriculture and the Ministry of Labour to meet and consult with these retrenched sugar workers from the West Coast and West Bank Demerara Estate. Also meet with the interested peasant farmers and their family from these productive eight Cane farmers’ Marketing Cooperative, that want land to continue with cane farming on the West Coast Demerara Estate land. 4. The minister of Agriculture and his bureaucrats, along with the Minister of Labour should and must go to the other Guysuco Estate area and meet with the sugar workers, especially retrenched sugar workers and landless farmers that want to go into private cane farming and organise them into group. Give them some of Guysuco sugar cane land, 10 to 15 acres each to do the cane farming and sell the cane to Guysuco Sugar factory in the area. Editor, these field sugar workers and peasant farmers and their family have many, many years of experience and knowledge about sugar cane farming, etc… These workers and farmers can be contacted very easily and quickly, because Guysuco have the personal information and pay list number for each of these sugar workers. GAWU, will also have some of these Workers information, names, etc…, based on the union dues contributions to GAWU and the other Sugar workers union. The Ministry of Labour/Cooperative Department should and must have membership records for the eight Cane Farmers’ marketing Cooperative society from Wales, between 1956-2016.
Editor, it will be easy to get the interested, retrenched sugar workers (especially field workers) from the Wales, Leonora and Uitvlugt Estate to go into cane farming and other crop farming. Organise these workers/farmers into 50-60 farmers group and give/lease them 10 to 15 acres of land each. Give and assist them with material, financial and machinery assistance for at least one year, to plant and grow sugar cane and sell same to Guysuco sugar factory. Editor, for your readers benefit, in 1956 Bookers Sugar Company formed the ‘Belle Vue Sugar Cane Farmers’ Pilot Project with 57 sugar workers and their family. These workers were chosen mainly from the East and West Demerara Sugar Estate in Guyana. Each farmer was given an individual lease tenant contract for 15 acres of land to develop, grow sugar cane and sell their cane to Wales Sugar factory. Also, they were each given/rented one, two bedroom concrete house, close to the area of the cane farming cultivation. After one to two years, two of the members and their family quit this pilot Scheme and migrated. Each of these 55 farmers, with the help of their immediate family, were producing between 45 to 50 ton sugar on their 15 acres of land and were paid based on the sugar their produced. 1n 1967, President L. S. F. Burnham led PNC Government transformed and renamed this Sugar Cane Farmers’ Pilot Project to the ‘Belle Vue Cane farmers’ Marketing Cooperative Society ( BVCFMCS), Reg. # 967.’ The individual land lease contract were cancelled and the Government gave the farmers a new 20 years collective land lease contract in the name of the BVCFMCS-Reg# 967, with option to renew at the end of the lease term. With the same 55 members, each member own one membership, one equal share & interest and 15 acres of land. The BVCFMCS-Reg# 967 most of the time, produce better cane, sucrose content(tc\ts) and sugar cane yield per acre, than Wales Estate and probably more than the other seven (7) peasant cane farmers’ Marketing Cooperative society, that supplying cane to Wales Sugar factory between 1956-2016. BVCFMCS was the best functioning Marketing Cooperative and the wealthiest, until 2010, when unjust political interference, skullduggery, fraudulent sale, illegal membership termination, etc…, were allowed to take place and continue until now. Wales Estate Factory closed in 2016.Can Guysuco, the Ministry of Labour (responsible for Cooperative) Ministry of Agriculture bureaucrats enlighten us and the public what assistance they have offered?
A.Specify, briefly, what type of assistance you have offered and given to the 8 Peasant Cane farmers’ Marketing Cooperative Society, and the hundreds of peasant cane farmers that were supplying sugar cane to Wales Estate, between 1956-2016?
These peasant cane farmers and their eight Marketing Cooperative Society sugar cane, contributed to approximately 50% of the Sugar produced at Wales Estate Sugar Factory. For these bureaucrats information, these are the following Cane Farmers marketing Cooperative Society that were supplying sugar cane to Wales Estate, before the factory closed. 1. Free & Easy Cane farmers’ Marketing Cooperative. 2. Sisters Cane Farmers’ Marketing Cooperative Society. 3. Good-In-Tent Cane Farmers’ Marketing Cooperative Society. 4. Belle Vue Cane Farmers’ Marketing Cooperative Society. 5. Stanlytown-LaRetraite Cane Farmers’ Marketing Cooperative Sociaty. 6. Canal # 2 Polder Cane Farmers’ Marketing Cooperative Society. 7. Nismes-La Grange Cane Farmers’ Marketing Cooperative Society. 8. Canal # 1 Polder Cane farmers’ Marketing Cooperative Society.
Yours Respectively,
THIS IDIOT TELLING GUYANA WE HAVE NO SAY IN THE 50% PROFIT SHARING AGREEMENT WE HAVE WITH EXXON.
Mar 29, 2024
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