TGI, Govt. avoid local cement crisis

May 06, 2012 News

…T&T strike triggered hiccup, local hoarders to be penalized

By Gary Eleazar

The Guyana Government and the local premier supplier for cement TGI Inc have avoided a potential

Minister with responsibility for Commerce, Irfaan Ali

crisis over the supply, demand and current price of the commodity on the local market.
On Thursday, Chief Government spokesperson, Dr. Roger Luncheon, told the nation that Cabinet was exploring a number of initiatives to stem what is believed to be a hoarding of cement to jack up the prices.
Dr. Luncheon spoke of a ‘name and shame’ campaign for those retailers of cement believed to be hoarding the commodity with a view to increasing its prices.
He spoke, too, of a last resort measure in the form of applying for a waiver of the Common External Tariff (CET) to import cement from extra regional sources.
Under the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME) initiative should a member country import a commodity already being produced within the region, then the tax (CET) would be applied and in special circumstances a waiver would be applied for.
The application is made to the CARICOM Council for Trade and Economic Development.
A TGI Inc source said that the Head of the Presidential Secretariat was blowing ‘hot air’ and that the administration has blown the situation out of proportion.
It was pointed out that the industrial action (strike) at the Trinidad Cement Company Limited (TCL) production plant caused a hiccup, delaying shipments of cement to the Guyana bagging plant (TGI).
This led to the company having to ship bulk cement for the Guyana Terminal from its bigger factory in Jamaica.
This publication was told that TGI has not increased the price of its cement but rather what had transpired, was that retailers, realizing that there was a delay in the shipment arbitrarily hiked the cement price by as much as 100 per cent in some cases.
This publication was told that one shipment of cement arrived from Jamaica over the past weekend and another shipment is expected shortly.
TGI’s Plant Manager, Mark Bender, has reported that following industrial action at TCL, measures were taken to ensure that the supply of cement to Guyana remained steady. “Arrangements were made for TGI to receive its cement supply from TCL’s subsidiary in Jamaica in an effort to ensure that there was no undue shortage on the local market.”
Minister with responsibility for Commerce in Guyana, Irfaan Ali, met with stakeholders last week and pointed to the fair trade and competition laws which could see the retailers being penalized for arbitrary price hikes and hoarding.
When contacted yesterday, Ali confirmed the TGI position and said that the current problem remains with the large scale suppliers of cement in Guyana.

The TGI plant in Georgetown

Without naming any of the companies or culpable entities, the Commerce Minister said that these entities had purchased cement in bulk, hoarded the commodity and took advantage of consumers.
He said that the Ministry is in continuous receipt of reports and that officials are making continuous checks to ensure that the entities are not breaching the competition laws of Guyana.
Ali assured that the Ministry has the situation under active monitoring with a view to ending the commodity hoarding which led to price increases.
He did confirm, also, that while the Government has hinted at applying for a waiver of the CET this has not been done as yet.