Dear Editor,
Rice harvesting for the 2015 Spring Crop is about to be completed in Region Two. It is reported that the average yield is approximately 50 bags per acre but the grade for farmers’ paddy has declined here on the Essequibo Coast. There is a significant disparity in the prices and grades. It is not clear what is responsible for this but it was reported that the drop in prices will have serious consequences on the farmers’ income. Extra A is now being bought at $2,200, A $2,100, B $2,000, C $1,900, Sample Grade is $1,800 and paddy with 7% damaged grains is being bought at $ 1,650. Previously it was $4,000 for Extra A, A $3,500, B $3,000, C $2,500 and the rest was negotiable by millers and farmers.
Farmers who were renting the lands from other rice farmers when the price for paddy was $4,000 a bag were paying $400,000 for a 10 acres block and now that the prices have fallen dramatically, they are finding it very difficult to make a profit and pay the landlord. The expenditure is more than their income and these are the ones who are crying out for losses. They have not been able to survive in a world rocked by successive economic crises and the spiralling high cost of inputs. Only the big farmers with their own machines who are renting lands can make a profit because they do not have to pay for ploughing and reaping because they own their own tractors and combines, which is a big chunk of their expenses.
And when they sell their paddy to the millers they get a preferential price for all their produce with a higher price than the small farmers. But the biggest problem they too face is payment on time by the millers. They, too, have to wait long periods until the millers receive payments from the buyer or the government as in the case with the PetroCaribe deal. So in the true sense they are all in the same boat sailing in an open sea. It is unfair to blame this new government for the state of the rice industry, after all this government is not even a year old and it received a country without a stable market for rice and paddy.
The previous administration knew that the PetroCaribe agreement was coming to an end in November 2015 and was told to find new markets for Guyana’s rice and paddy by the Maduro government. The agreement was signed in 2005, by the late president Hugo Chavez and former President Jagdeo. Ever since the signing of the agreement, Guyana was told by the IMF that Venezuela wouldn’t be able to sustain the oil for rice and paddy concessionary programme due to its own economic crisis and the drop of oil prices on the international market. Guyana was also told not to place much reliance on the high prices being enjoyed and not place too much dependence on PetroCaribe oil for paddy.
These days millers are also buying and paying farmers by the tons and kg for their paddy which is much more difficult for them to calculate their money and weight for their produce. They are at a disadvantage because they don’t know the conversion from pounds to metric as for example, 1000 kg of paddy which is dried to 14% moisture and cleaned is = 1 ton of paddy and 1 kg =2.2 lbs.
Yours faithfully,
Mohamed Khan
