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Tonight, the sugar industry remains in a state of limbo. ASR/BSI, which owns the mill, wants to start the crop by mid December - but the BSCFA, which is the largest growers' group, has not agreed to sign the proposed 4 year commercial agreement.
They also want the government's promised Commission of Inquiry to be properly in place before they agree to even a one year commercial agreement.
Well, the chair of the sugar subcommittee, Minister Kareem Musa, told us that in terms of the commission of inquiry, it is the PM who would decide the composition.
Today the PM explained that they cannot force a decision between BSCFA and BSI since it's a private transaction but he's urging the farmers to sign a three year agreement. He also explained what they can expect from the commission of inquiry.
John Briceno. Prime Minister
"That's a long standing issue and challenge where the BSCFA has been refusing to sign a new contract. I think what's important to point out is that this is a private transaction and as much as the government would want to help the BSCFA or anybody, we cannot get involved, it is a private transaction. We are doing everything to support the industry, we are setting up a Commissioner of Inquiry to see where we can improve our productivity, what are the steps that we need to take to increase profitability in the industry but a commission of inquiry only makes recommendations so it's important for all parties to understand, for the cane farmers to understand and for BSI that the commission of inquiry would only give recommendations. I am urging BSCFA to sign a three year contract so that they could have some sense of stability of the next three years and then that would give you a time to be able to, for the commissioner of inquiry to go through it's process, to come up with some recommendations and then to see what can be implemented and what cannot be implemented. Again, the government is prepared to support the farmers as much as we possibly can just like we're prepared to support the factory because at the end of the day if the sugar industry, if we fail in this industry, it affects everyone, if we succeed, all of us benefit from these efforts."
"I want to put on record and I want to assure the cane farmers that it's not the government that's holding this back, we've been prepared to do this a long time ago but some associations and I don't want to mention which one in particular continue to be changing the rules or continue to be changing the ask and that is why we have been holding back but the important point to make is that the government is committed to setting up the commission of inquiry for us to be able to take a wholistic look of the industry, how we can modernize it, how we can improve yields, how we can improve the production of sugar from cane and what other possible byproducts can be produced to be able to make the industry a more profitable one for everyone."
