Mealybugs Put Sugar Production Under Pressure

A tiny pest is creating a major threat for Belize’s sugar industry. Mealybugs are spreading through cane fields in the north, weakening plants and putting already-declining yields at further risk. Today, industry stakeholders took the media into the fields to show how they are fighting the infestation. With labor shortages adding to the pressure, officials warn that the sector must act quickly to prevent even greater losses.

 

Olivia Carballo-Avilez, Cane Farmer Relations Manager, BSI

“Our mill has the capacity of milling 1.25 million tons of cane and producing about one hundred and twenty-three thousand, one hundred and twenty-five thousand tons of sugar. We’re not doing that at the moment. Because of fusarium last year we lost from, I think it was about ten, twenty percent last year. So this year we came in at 823,000 long tons. So you can see the gap between what our capacity is and what we’re actually getting in terms of cane supply. That is concerning now with mealybug. Mealybug seems to be a pest due to higher temperatures and the temperature fluctuation between the moisture and the higher temperature. And we have it in the entire of Central America. Nicaragua, El Salvador Guatemala, we’re all battling this let’s call it a new pest of economic importance. It hadn’t been that issue. And so definitely we’re concerned about the drop in cane supply. The mill has fixed costs, so if we produce one-point-two-five or we produce 700,000 tons, we have to pay the cost. So that makes the operation a lot more expensive and of course that’s very concerning for the mill, and of course for the farmers because we won’t be able to produce the amount of sugar to sell.”

 

Attention readers: This online newscast is a direct transcript of our evening television broadcast. When speakers use Kriol, we have carefully rendered their words using a standard spelling system.

 

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