Dear Editor,
We cannot produce rice without TSP fertiliser.
The RPA said that it is bringing cheap urea but they can’t say anything about TSP. As far as I can see the government does not have the technical people to advise them.
Rice farmers have to use TSP fertiliser every crop or else the yield is low and the quality of the paddy is substandard.
For the last crop, my father purchased a bag of TSP for $18,000 which came from Suriname because there was very little in Guyana. Most farmers on Essequibo Coast did not use TSP last crop. So for this crop if TSP is not available then it will make no sense to plant rice.Even if somebody imports the TSP and sells it at very high price we still cannot plant because the cost of production will be too high.
The RPA people do not know anything about rice because they keep telling my father and other farmers that they can grow the rice with bare urea. That is like asking a man to live on dhal and rice with no bhajee. The government cannot wait on the private importers to bring the TSP and sell at very high prices. It makes no sense to plant rice if we cannot get urea and TSP at good prices. The importers are fleecing the farmers.
We want to know what the government is doing.
Yours faithfully,
Ramdular Singh
