Rice on the rise – Govt’s investment yielding dividends

Dear Editor,
Let this sink in please. It is that according to a new rice market report recently published by market research firm IndexBox, “Rice consumption around the world is anticipated to continue to grow steadily around 1.1 per cent per annum to 2025, when it is expected to reach a market volume of 570 million tonnes (Mt). And we all know that rice is a food staple for more than 3.5 billion people around the world, particularly in Asia, Latin America, and parts of Africa. Thus, it’s basically impossible to overstate how important rice is to the ways people around the globe eat. Rice is actually the source of one-fifth of all the calories consumed by the world’s population. No wonder then, and being quite ‘on the ball,’ the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Government is aiming to ramp up rice production from 560,000 to 870,000 tonnes metric tonnes by 2025.
What is good about rice (other crops too) is that prudent investment the from Government is paying great dividends. In fact, as mentioned in the press, the recap shows that in the rice sector, over $100 million was spent to improve rice yields. Then extra support in pest control was provided to farmers. To top it off, the Agriculture Ministry realised the operating of the Value-Added Laboratory in March 2022.
In contrast, we can revisit what obtained between 2015 and 2020. I mean the stats can be brought up too, where they will show that APNU/AFC just mercilessly kept on reducing the agriculture budget every year since they got into Government (by more than $3 billion since 2015). This reduction of course affected rice significantly. As a matter of fact, the coalition Government, A Partner For National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC), even got vindictive at various times. For example, in their tenure, 2000 acres of rice crops were threatened by the withholding of irrigation water from rice farmers (by GuySuCo); rice farmers were threatened by the National Drainage and Irrigation Authority (NDIA) with withholding water for irrigation; millers were owed more than $2 billion since July 2017; and rice farmers from Hope were given notice to vacate their rice fields. Just imagine what would have happened if they had managed to steal the 2020 elections.
Editor, I will not be able, in this letter, to comment on the many other areas of agriculture, where the Government is beginning to reap great and deserved benefits, and what all of these mean for us as Guyanese. So, let me point a few important things.
We must not ‘take for granted’ that these results are ‘matter of fact,’ or simply ‘easy to come by.’ There are many challenges to rice cultivation: high cost of inputs; low price of palay; lack of capital; labour problem; lack of postharvest facilities; pest and diseases; and irrigation system. What I mean is that to turn around rice alone is a phenomenal achievement.
I recall last year what Minister of Agriculture, Zulfikar Mustapha said. He noted that Guyana was able “… to secure additional markets for rice exports, and with the interventions made in the industry since August (of 2020), that plans to double production and increase export over five years can be realised.” He added at that time too that “The two European destinations, Hungary and Latvia, together received some 250 metric tonnes of white rice last year,” and “…with the recent exports to the Caribbean, there are indications that more persons are interested in Guyana’s rice.” Hence, “…Government is investing heavily to ensure there be sufficient rice for new markets.” After all, rice is the Government’s business and the Minister and his crew are working 24/7 to make the industry flourish, as it was pre-2015.
At the global level, the UN, via the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organisation), is serious about providing the means to produce rice that is better for farmers, better for the environment, and better for agri-businesses. This is exactly how the Government is going about the now burgeoning rice sector.

Yours truly,
H Singh