After a dry and fiery month of May, many farmers were struggling to keep their crops alive. But for others like the sugar cane farmers, they used the drought to maintain harvest production. But now that the heavy rains are here, farmers are struggling to harvest their cane. And according to the minister - because of this - they are falling behind in harvesting and production.
Jose Mai, Minister of Agriculture
"We have had both extremes. I mean in the last what in 20 days or less we went from zero rainfall to up to 9-10 inches of rainfall. Both extreme Ms with 9 inches of rainfall in about 15 days there's no way you can harvest sugar cane so the mill had to go on a pause. There is still a substantial amount of sugar at cane in the fields. I believe that if the rains continue we will not be able to harvest the sugar cane. We already had. Problem because of the shortage of labor so we couldn't get all the cane harvested in time and so I believe that if it doesn't stop raining we won't be able to harvest the cane. And I don't think we have reached the million tons yet. We are about to reach that million ton but I don't think we've reached it yet. So that's one thing."
