Killing the goose

Aug 29, 2008 Features / Columnists

In the midst of trying to ensure that Guyana takes its rightful place in the world, especially the world of development, there are elements who are trying to thwart this exercise.

It is as though they fail to recognize that the man who kills the goose in his quest for many golden eggs may actually find that there is nothing more, no golden eggs; no goose.

Sugar has always been a mainstay of the economy and in the heady days it allowed for the expansion of so many social services.

The industry also created employment for the largest section of the population and for this reason, while other countries are closing down their sugar industry, Guyana set about expanding its own by way of the new Skeldon Modernization Plant.

The price cuts implemented by the European Union did not help but Guyana was equal to the challenge and the government set about lowering the cost of production to make Guyana’s sugar competitive on the world market.

This is not an easy task but with the declining workforce there is need for mechanization and this has begun.

But the remaining sugar workers, rather than think about the greater good to the country and to their very future, are seeking to hold the industry to ransom.

All over the country the people are feeling the brunt of the high cost of food, particularly imported foods, because this is a global phenomenon.

Timely management of the agricultural sector has protected Guyana from the full effects of this phenomenon and the Guyanese people can still eat.

The higher cost of fertilizer and other inputs have been negated by prudent government measures so that the price of food reaching the consumer is low when compared to other countries, including the great United States.

At the same time, many persons are doing things to make their condition less burdensome and in the process, are actually creating opportunities to make money.

Sugar workers over the years have been among the most resilient and many have been known to subsidize their earnings from the sugar estates.

It is therefore surprising that the very sugar workers are of the view that they need to be better paid than the rest of the society.

Last year the government was quick to point out to these very sugar workers that the industry, in addition to having to pay more for fertilizer, agricultural spares, and other inputs to make the sugar industry viable, paid more than half of its export earnings to the sugar workers.

This year, a few months after a whopping eight per cent wage and salary hike, the sugar workers want more. The sugar union, knowing the conditions, has not supported the strike, but this is a case of workers seeking to dictate to the government.

With sugar being important, there are certain measures that the government will have to take to protect the industry, and in the final analysis, the very workers who feel that they are doing the right thing may find themselves losing.

As it stands now, there is talk about closing one of the Demerara sugar estates and while this is not a done deal, the striking workers are by their very actions forcing this decision since the desire is to lower the cost of production.

The government has taken steps to protect the very sugar workers who are threatening the industry. The first set of people to get subsidized foods was the sugar workers.

The government took flour, oil and other imported foods that attracted higher prices on the local market to them in their communities.

Rice that experienced a hike on the local market was provided to the sugar workers at a drastically subsidized cost. Therefore, claims that the government has no interest in the sugar workers are most unfounded.

The sugar workers must also realize that they have enjoyed a privileged position. The other categories of government workers, aware of the constraints in the economy, accepted the five per cent offered at the end of the year.

The economy stands to lose because if the sugar fails to reach its international targets, then the country as a whole would suffer.

This cannot be allowed to happen because if it does then all the critics would blame the government when the very sugar workers know that they would be the ones to blame.