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Rice worries
The ongoing protests by rice farmers in Essequibo highlight the challenges that must be addressed by the authorities if the industry is to continue on its upward trajectory that has proven to be the bright spot in the agriculture sector. With sugar seemingly locked into a death spiral, we must ensure that we do not lose our most valuable resource – farmers. While we may boast of having limitless amounts of land, this is worthless from a developmental standpoint unless we have people who are willing to work that land.
The movement of people out of the sugar industry is not just a problem for that industry but for the entire country, since the experience of other countries has shown that such an exodus from agriculture is usually irreversible. Yet our comparative advantage in development lies in agriculture because of our abundant fertile land in a world of growing food insecurity.
It is important to understand why the protests have occurred in Essequibo and not elsewhere. Rice is the only industry on the heavily populated Essequibo Coast and because of its husbandry and processing demands, it is also the largest employer there. As rice goes, so does the rest of “the Coast” since the revenue it generates supports most of the other services and ancillary occupations.
But the amount of land on the Essequibo Coast is fixed at 33,000 acres for reasons of geography and hydraulics for almost half a century. There has been talk by the government about opening up an additional 5,000 acres, but this is still on the drawing boards. Because of this fixed acreage, cultivation there has been the most intensive in Guyana. With water for irrigation from the Tapacuma Conservancy, drainage into the Essequibo River and meticulous husbandry practices, farmers in Essequibo routinely harvest 40 bags of paddy per acre compared to the 28 elsewhere.
With the price of paddy shooting over $4000 per bag in the last few years, primarily because of the lucrative Venezuelan market secured by the government, demand for land has increased: rentals have now touched $40,000 per acre. But combined with the high prices and quantities of fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides and other inputs, rice farming on the Essequibo Coast is an expensive proposition.
So when, as has happened so many times in the past and is the case once again, millers do not pay farmers up front or promptly, the latter are plunged into quite dire straits. This is exacerbated by their need to begin field preparations for the next crop. Many of them have to resort to the banks for loans that have to be repaid with interest, while the amounts owed to them by millers are interest-free. Farmers, then, end up financing the rice industry.
This last crop there were two problems that compounded the farmers’ woes: extensive paddy bug infestation and uncertainty over the Venezuelan contract that would have covered the paddy just purchased by millers. Last year, Guyana produced 422,000 tons of rice. Two-thirds of that amount was exported to Venezuela under the agreement and this year, production and exports had been expected to increase. The paddy-bug lowers the quality of the paddy immeasurably and the two factors have caused millers to slash the prices of paddy drastically.
On the issue of the Venezuelan contract, a month ago, Jagnarine Singh, General Manager of Guyana Rice Development Board (GRDB) said a deal had been finalized but not on paper. The agreement included the quantity; the selling price for rice and paddy; terms of sales; and shipping conditions. While we understand the uncertainty introduced by the passing of Hugo Chavez, the GRDB has to push for a signing of the contract.
The Minister of Agriculture has intervened to offer some relief to the farmers on the paddy bug problem, but this is locking the stable after the horse has bolted. The GRDB should have been much more pro-active in monitoring the quality of pesticides that are shipped into the country. The Factory Act that covers millers’ payment to farmers must also be monitored more stringently.
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