Vice-President Bharrat Jagdeo on Sunday dropped a broad hint that there would be no revival of sugar at the Skeldon estate on the scale that had been promised by the government and envisaged by Corentyne residents.
With the infrastructure at the Guyana Sugar Corporation’s (GuySuCo) Skeldon estate left to deteriorate under the APNU+AFC government following its closure in 2017, Jagdeo said it will require billions to be invested to rehabilitate the existing infrastructure before hinting at a smaller scale of production.
While he blamed deterioration of equipment between 2015 and 2020 on APNU+AFC, the Skeldon factory had been in strife long before that and was a high cost producer. The ambitious US$200m project inaugurated during the Jagdeo presidency had been widely considered to be a catastrophic failure and underpinned by the initial decision to hire an inexperienced Chinese factory builder. This led to the eventual decision by APNU+AFC to close the estate in 2017. However, in its manifesto, for the 2020 general elections, the PPP/C had vowed to reopen the estate if it won power and it is this expectation that Jagdeo sought to downplay on Saturday in an address to the Corentyne business community.
Noting that the PPP/C government is committed to reopening the sugar estate in the future, he informed that they will be scaling back on sugar production at the estate and examining other revenue-generating options to create jobs for those sugar workers who were severed from their livelihoods and placed on the breadline.
“We had promised to reopen the sugar factory… here at Skeldon the infrastructure is degraded and it would take billions of dollars to put in back the infrastructure. Nevertheless we are looking at several solutions; one, we are looking at [is] a smaller-scale sugar industry; two, power generation; three, a massive aquaculture project that can generate lots of income and jobs here; and four, the cultivation of industrial hemp in this area…” Jagdeo told members of the Upper Corentyne business community on Sunday night at the Classic Hotel, Skeldon.
On October 4 last year, Jagdeo had delivered a similar message to former Skeldon estate workers. The Skeldon sugar factory was touted as the saviour of the industry when it was launched in 2008, however, the Chinese-built factory failed to deliver the goods and never reached anywhere near its rated potential. The Opposition and critics had labelled the estate, a “white elephant.”
Jagdeo explained to the gathering on Sunday that the alternative industries government is looking at for job creation are lucrative and have the ability to generate more opportunities than what was lost in 2017.
The Vice-President disclosed that with the aquaculture development they will have to convert some sugar cane fields for aquaculture farm use. He noted too that the hemp industry has the potential to generate high incomes and ensure job opportunities are created for sugar workers who have been terminated.
“So we are passing legislation next month and we have identified this area and Region 10 to grow industrial hemp. Hemp is a very lucrative industry, it has to be properly managed but it can bring thousands of jobs to the area,” Jagdeo told the gathering.
He stated that the Berbice economy had suffered significantly following the closure of the estates, and as such, the administration is searching for solutions to reverse the hardships families have faced over the years.
“These are just some of the plans to ensure sugar workers [can be re-employed]. Every night we go to bed thinking about these promises and how we can find solutions…”Jagdeo stated before he told the gathering that they have created some 3,000 part-time jobs.
The closure by APNU+AFC of four sugar-producing estates – Skeldon, Rose Hall, Enmore, and Wales – had placed some 7,000 persons on the breadline with just over 3,000 of the former employees coming from Region Six. Approximately 1,830 workers from the Skeldon estate were terminated when the estate closed.
Upon taking office in 2020, the government had pumped some $5 billion into its revitalisation plan for the industry.
President Irfaan Ali had told this newspaper that his government had to start from scratch and is focussed on redeveloping farmlands in order to deliver on its campaign promise to reopen the shuttered estates.
Just after taking office, he had stressed that despite the dire situation faced by GuySuCo, he was determined that the estates be brought back to a standard that would be attractive for investors. “Let me say this – the political will and the commitment has not diminished by one iota. It has been strengthened because we are going to invest in the industry. We are going to create, bring back those jobs, bring back economic life and livelihood to those communities.”
In its manifesto for the 2020 general elections. The PPP/C vowed to reopen three of the four estates shuttered by the APNU+AFC government – East Demerara, Rose Hall and Skeldon. It also announced a development plan for the former Wales estate where the factory had already been dismantled.
