As I read the history of Guyana, one of the points emanating from scholars of previous generations is the uncompetitive nature of sugar production in British Guiana. In a 1945 paper, Sir Eric Williams was one of the first scholars to imply the polder system of agriculture decreased the productivity. Dr Walter Rodney (1981) and Alan Adamson (1972) further noted that sugar survived because of estate amalgamation, improvement in boiler technology, the lobbying power of the planters in Britain and wage suppression through slavery and indentureship. When Britain moved to Ricardian free trade in the middle nineteenth century, British Guiana sugar came under increasing pressure as other colonies and non-colonies gained access to the British market. The situation was
