GuySuCo, GRDB partner to better utilise Demerara Sugar Terminal bond

Jan 21, 2022 News

Kaieteur News – Instead of helping to boost the capacity of the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo), the Demerara Sugar Terminal (DST), along with its berthing facility, has been costing the corporation some G$110 million annually for the past five years.
This state of affairs, GuySuCo said in a release, has led to it partnering with the Guyana Rice Development Board (GRDB) with a view of getting more bang for each buck spent.
The Corporation revealed that since the closure of four sugar estates – Wales, Enmore, Rose Hall and Skeldon – during the 2015-2020 tenure of the APNU+AFC regime, there was not adequate commodity to export. As a consequence, the release added, the south bond at the DST was moth-balled. Nevertheless, the corporation said that the operating cost for both the DST which was built in the 1960s and is strategically located on the east bank of the Demerara River, and its prime berthing facility of just over 130 meters in length and 7 meters draft at high tide, was approximately G$110 million per year between 2017 and 2021.
As such the corporation said, “…such a cost has been unsustainable” ever since the closure of the four sugar estates in a much smaller sugar belt that has only exported 33,117 MT in 2021 and produced only 58,025 MT in the same year after the worst floods in 40 years.
Moreover, it was revealed that GuySuCo’s strategic plan that was approved by its Board of Directors in March 2021 continues to guide the executive management in seeking out opportunities to unleash the potential of its non-core assets, among other planned initiatives.
Therefore, in a close partnership with the GRDB, the Corporation will utilise the south bond of the DST to assist with the export of rice while the north bond will continue to be used exclusively for bulk sugar export, as has been the case since the closure of the four sugar estates. This move, the Corporation assured, is in compliance with its strategic plan and the directives of its shareholders.
According to its Factory Operations Director (ag), Vijay Goberdhan, “several critical conveyor systems and motors have to be rehabilitated to implement the elements of the strategic plan and to action this new collaborative relationship with the GRDB.” He related too that bills of quantity are being prepared to estimate the cost of the project and “that information will be submitted to the leadership at GuySuCo, the Ministry of Agriculture and the GRDB shortly.”
Agriculture Minister, Mr. Zulfikar Mustapha, had on January 12, last visited the sugar terminal “to survey for himself how the Ministry of Agriculture can assist in the fast-tracking of this collaboration between the rice and sugar industry which is a welcomed development,” said GuySuCo’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Mr. Sasenarine Singh.
He is of the belief that “The outcome of these partnerships will only redound to the benefit of all and especially those in the sugar industry as it shares the cost of managing the sugar terminal and multiply the benefits to the country.”
Even as he complemented Minister Mustapha for spearheading the initiative, the CEO noted that GuySuCo is looking forward to working closely with both the GRDB and the Guyana Rice Milling Association in bringing this project to reality.

Discover more from Kaieteur News

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

Latest News