A FRIEND OF THE FARMERS

Jan 21, 2014 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

Rice was one of the star performers of the Guyanese economy in 2013. For this, two persons need to be thanked, because without the action they took, the rice industry would not have been revived.
After the early boom of the 1990s had passed, rice prices began to fall even as production costs were increasing. These increased costs were primarily but not exclusively as a result of the increase in the cost of petrol. Rice production had become so mechanized days that tilling, planting, reaping and milling all were capital-intensive activities. This demanded energy, the cost of which soared because of rising petrol prices. The cost of fertilizers also increased. This compounded the problems of the industry since farmers had become reliant on artificial fertilizers to improve their yields.
Rice farmers love to complain, but amid rising production there was a problem with production costs and this ate away at profits. Their plight was aggravated by the constant prices paid for rice exports in the European market.
Rice has always been at the mercy of the weather. Bad weather and poor drainage perennially threatened to put farmers on the breadline.
At one stage rice farmers were threatened with mass bankruptcy. Many of them had overextended on loans from local commercial banks and these loans were being called-in by the banks. Even though production continued to increase, low prices, flooding and high input costs were threatening the very survival of the industry.
Rice has been the success story of the PPPC administration. It is true that gold is glittering, but gold’s climb was attributable to foreign investment by Brazilians who came when local miners were departing the “backdams.” The Brazilians brought investment and much needed technology at a time when prices were low.
Rice did not have a similar fate. At one stage, the banks were cautious about further exposure in the industry. Today they are lining up to lend to the farmers.
Minister Leslie Ramsammy is today basking in the glory of last year’s record-breaking production of rice. But the person most instrumental in ensuring that rice production continued to increase was Ramsammy’s predecessor, Robert Persaud.
Persaud has been the most successful agriculture minister ever.
Sugar has been a blot against his record, but when it comes to the farming sector, Persaud remains the most popular Minister on the PPPC’s benches because of the remarkable support that he gave to farmers, all farmers, and not just rice farmers.
Under his watch there was significant and unprecedented investment in drainage and irrigation. Anyone who has followed the challenges of drainage in Black Bush Polder, the largest rice growing area in Guyana, will testify as to the tremendous investment that was made in drainage and irrigation in that area. So committed was Persaud to farmers in the Polder that for the first time ever, heavy earth-moving machines were placed permanently on location to ensure continuous work on the drainage system.
In the Mahaicony area, Persaud helped farmers a great deal. He addressed their problems promptly. If tomorrow the farmers of Mahaicony were asked to name their most popular Minister, they would not go for their own daughter of the soil, but would without hesitation name Robert Persaud as their favourite Minister. He has done more for them than all the other Ministers combined. Period!
It was he, too, that was responsible for reading the riot act to millers. He also tabled legislation to strengthen the hand of government in dealing with unscrupulous millers who were in the habit of taking farmers produce and not making timely payments.
It was under his watch also that the Hope Canal Project got going thereby ensuring that water will not have to be released again into the creeks where a great deal of rice is planted.
When markets were being threatened and prices were unattractive, Hugo Chavez stepped in and committed to annual purchases of rice. Today Guyana exports more rice to Venezuela than it does to Europe. The Venezuelan market has been a lifeline to rice farmers.
The two individuals who therefore deserve the greatest credit for the revival of rice in Guyana for the record–breaking production are former Agriculture Minister, Robert Persaud and the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.
Rice farmers should build a monument to these men. It was because of their instrumentality that today the sun is shining so brightly on the rice industry.

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