“There was never a shortage of sugar” – GuySuCo CEO

…says packaged sugar was temporarily unavailable, bulk sugar remained on market

Following reports of a shortage of sugar on the domestic market, the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo) has announced that packaged sugar is now available for purchase at estates across the country.
Of recent, there has been widespread complaints of a shortage of sugar in the local market but Chief Executive Officer of GuySuCo, Paul Cheong, contended that there was no shortage of the commodity – only the unavailability of packaged sugar.
In a statement on Thursday, GuySuCo announced that packaged sugar is now available for sale. It was explained that the production for the second crop of 2024 commenced last week and the sale of packaged sugar commenced on Monday, August 19.
As a result, packaged sugar is now available at the Blairmont Estate and at the Albion Estate from today.
Additionally, bagged sugar is currently available at the Albion and Rose Hall Estates.
Uitvlugt Estate commenced production on Wednesday and will have sugar available for sale next Monday, August 26.
However, the GuySuCo CEO admitted that prior to this second crop production, packaged sugar was unavailable.
“There was never a shortage of sugar… It was the packaged we were out of. But the sugar as a whole we had right through,” Cheong told Guyana Times on Thursday.
In the first crop of this year, GuySuCo fell short of its production target, only producing 6,738 tonnes of sugar from the initial target of 16,000 tonnes.
This, according to the GuySuCo Boss, was one of the factors contributing to the unavailability of packaged sugar – a higher quality that is ISO certified – on the local market.
“The amount of packaged we made sold out but the first crop was a smaller crop. But we keep enough bulk [or bagged] sugar to supply [the domestic market] which many of the supermarkets used to repackage in plastic bags,” Cheong stated.
The Blairmont Estate produces the popular Demerara Gold packaged sugar, while the Albion Estate produces the Albion Gems.
However, Albion was unable to grind sugar canes during the first crop, that is, between February to April 2024, because of the February 3 fire to its powerhouse facility.
Earlier this month, Agriculture Minister Zulfikar Mustapha told the National Assembly that Government expended some $600 million to rehabilitate the control room at the Albion Factory, where millions of dollars in specialised pieces of eequipment were destroyed by the fire resulting in the disruption of the operations at the estate.
The Guyana Fire Service had said the blaze was electrical in origin.
Significantly restricted
Meanwhile, the agriculture minister had further explained to the National Assembly that the first crops shortfall was as a result of the devastating effects of the prolonged drought, which “significantly restricted the growth of canes.”
During the first crop, the Uitvlugt Sugar Estate produced 2874.3 tonnes while Blairmont produced 2084.8 tonnes and Rose Hall with the lowest at 1779.8 tonnes.
Mustapha had also assured the National Assembly earlier this month that there will be no shortage of sugar now or later in the year.
With sugar production increasing from 40,000 in 2022 to 60,000 in 2023, GuySuCo has set a target for 2024 to produce 100,000 tonnes of sugar.
Only a few days ago, Cheong expressed his confidence that the sugar corporation will meet its production target in this this second crop – a point he reiterated to this newspaper.
“The El Niño affected the first crop so it affected the amount of sugar we produced… Well, with this crop here, we will have much more [sugar produced than the last crop]. And we will package all of the sugar at Blairmont, or the majority… But we have sufficient sugar now on the market,” the head of the sugar corporation assured.
Meanwhile, GuySuCo has declared that there has been no price change to neither packaged nor bagged sugar, and cautioned businesses to not hike up prices.
With the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Government having injected over $17 billion into the sugar industry and currently supporting close to 8000 workers, President Dr Irfaan Ali has, for some time, made it clear that his Administration would continue to invest in the sector to bring it up to viability.
Between 2016 and 2017, the A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) regime closed several estates across Guyana – an action that displaced more than 7000 sugar workers, who were not only without jobs but who had no means to support their families and contribute to their villages as well as the national economy.
In fact, only earlier this month, Opposition Leader Aubrey Norton revealed that a People’s National Congress (PNC)-led administration would not support expansion of the sugar industry. The PNC is the largest party within the APNU/AFC Coalition.
“I believe that sugar has to be produced in limited quantities. The task therefore is ours to find alternative employment for the people in the sugar industry. I don’t think you should close it and leave them without employment,” Norton posited during a recent appearance on the Globespan 24X7 programme.
Since assuming office in August 2020, however, the PPP/C Government has been working to reverse the damage done by the Coalition regime by rehired some 2000 of those dismissed workers and injecting over $1.1 billion into reopening the Rose Hall Estate.
In 2023 alone, some $8.1 billion was invested to advance the revitalisation efforts of the sugar industry.
This year, Government budged some $6 billion. Moreover, the National Assembly just two weeks ago approved an additional $9.5 billion in supplementary funding for GuySuCo. (G8)