Hugh Martin
THE CELEBRATION of 'Sugar Week' from June 11-17 by the Jamaica Association of Sugar Technologists (JAST) may have been viewed by some as a self-indulgent exercise of a group of people reluctant to accept the inevitability of their demise. Had those sugar-bashers taken the time to attend even one of the events carried out during the week, they would have come away wanting to take another look at this industry which to them has been associated with so much pain, violence and exploitation over its 300-year history.
Not having had the benefit of hearing the experiences of those farmers, workers, technologists and administrators derived from research and involvement, they will continue to base their arguments on the undeniable facts at hand. These include declining production, reducing prices, high production costs and inefficiencies at field and factory level. In addition, they will cite the enormous amounts taken from the public purse to keep the Government-owned factories afloat. Compelling basis for the argument to shut down the industry, aren't they?
OF A DIFFERENT VIEW
But Livingstone Morrison, president of the Sugar Company of Jamaica (SCJ) that has for so long depended on government grants to keep the mills turning at less than a third of their capacity, is of a much different view. Speaking at the launch of Sugar Week in Westmoreland, Mr. Morrison declared that the local industry had the capacity to "remain competitive". I believe he was misquoted and must have said "to become competitive" for everyone knows of the inefficiencies, especially within the SCJ. Indeed, in identifying the need for plant modernisation, improved field operations and greater labour productivity, he was acknowledging the uncompetitiveness of the industry in its present state.
The question has been asked and could be repeated: What has happened to the billions of dollars that the Government is supposed to have dumped into the company since its re-acquisition just under a decade ago. We have heard that much of it has gone to pay off debts that were incurred prior to re-acquisition but quite a bit was supposed to have been used for retooling of factories. Apparently the SCJ, which accounts for about 70 per cent of the industry, has been cash-starved from day one and the funds received have never been enough to get it out of debt and into proper operating condition. Based on the performance of the two privately-owned factories and that of a number of farmers, it is clear that with proper management the sugar industry can be viable in spite of the difficulties it has been experiencing in recent times.
Agriculture and Land Minister, Roger Clarke, himself a successful cane farmer, speaking at the launch function , seems to have been singing from the same hymn sheet as Mr. Morrison at last. (And why not, since they were at the same church service.) He declared that sugar cane was "still the best agricultural crop that can be grown in Jamaica".
'LEAVE SUGAR ALONE'
And, as if they were crafting a sugar Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), Opposition spokesman on Agriculture, Senator Anthony Johnson, joined in to declare the importance of the sugar industry which was occupying only 70,000 acres of the 400,000 acres of land available for farming.
"Leave sugar alone," he urged. "Use some of the other acreage that is idle to grow other crops. There is room for all of them." Senator Johnson was at a JAST field day in Clarendon on Thursday, June 15, part of the activities of Sugar Week.
Yet, all of those declarations could not be enough to convince any doubtful Thomas to invest in sugar when it is well known that the price paid for our exports to the European Union will be reduced by 39 per cent over the next four years. But those persons, who attended the seminar put on by the Sugar Week committee at Bernard Lodge on Tuesday, June 13, were very anxious to go out and plant cane when they heard from Mr. Lindsay Jolly, senior economist with the International Sugar Organisation (ISO) and Mr. Joshua Jaddoo, factory services manager at the Sugar Industry Research Institute on the real benefits to be derived from the production of ethanol, molasses, rum and electricity. The sugar cane is demonstrating once again that it is "a hard plant fe dead".
Hugh Martin is a communication consultant and farm broadcaster at humar@cwjamaica.com.
