Seven Indian experts to be embedded in GuySuCo’s management

Seven Indian experts in the sugar industry will be embedded in the management of the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo) “to support further mechanisation and transformation of the industry,” President Dr Irfaan Ali said on Saturday morning.

Already, 12 experts from Cuba are in the country to help with the revitalisation of the industry, the President said in a statement live on his Facebook page from the Kingston, Georgetown Seawall.

President Ali said several factors, including drought, led to the contraction of the industry by 60% in the first half of the year.

He noted that when the PPP returned to government in 2020, it had to reinvest in sugar in a major way, such as rebuilding factories, clearing cane lands that had become forested due to neglect, rebuilding dams and drainage and irrigation canals and structures, and rehiring thousands of workers.

Ali’s administration is working on rebuilding the industry following neglect and the callous way some factories were shut down by the former APNU+AFC government during their 2015-2020 term in office.

With all the work being done, including increased mechanisation in cane harvesting (now at 43%) and the planting of new lands, the President said the government is hoping for an “enormous bounce back” in the second half of this year and continuing into the first crop next year.