PM Briceño Eyes Breakthrough in Sugar Negotiations

The delayed sugar crop is finally inching closer to a start, and the Prime Minister is sounding cautiously optimistic. Now, here’s the situation, there’s still no signed commercial agreement between cane farmers and Belize Sugar Industries, and concerns are mounting over labor shortages and rising production costs. So yes, the industry is under pressure. But Prime Minister John Briceño says talks are moving forward, and there’s goodwill on both sides to strike a deal that works for farmers, millers, and the country. Beyond that, he’s also looking at the bigger picture, long-term challenges like finding enough manual labor and modernizing the industry through mechanization and new cane varieties. Here’s what he told us about where negotiations stand and the future of sugar in Belize.

 

Prime Minister John Briceño

“What I’m being told that been going well the chairman of BSCFA did send me a message that the negotiations are going well. I think they’re trying to settle on the length of the agreement. They wanted seven years and I think BSI wanted less. But that’s still in working. But there’s goodwill on both sides in trying to find a commercial agreement in the interest of both sides. The issue of manual labor, they already have all these natural issues. Now, manual labor, the cost has increased because of work permit and the work stamp.”

 

Reporter

“Will the government be addressing that?”

 

Prime Minister John Briceño

“I don’t think it’s so much about the charges, because the charges has always been there. We have not raised any charges. I think more than anything else the availability of manual labor. And secondly, that sometimes the ministries they take too long in the approval. Of course, nobody wants pay for anything. If they don’t have to pay, the better for them. But that’s something that we could discuss later on. But more importantly we have to be able to respond quicker in the approval of this, of these of these applications. But more importantly, when we did the commission of inquiry and then after that I put the four associations along with the Ministry of Sugar and Ministry of Agriculture to look at the commission of Inquiry and what recommendations we can put into place. And one of them is that we have to start to move towards mechanization. And since we want to make monies available for farmers to be able to replant, then a new varieties of cane that can be more resistant to the fungus and to other pests. We have to ensure now that, that is gonna be done from mechanized harvesting, which will be much longer fields with no – with no mounds on it, where plant on it and a gradient so that when it rain the water runs off. So it’s a part of the whole modernization of the industry to make it more effective and more efficient, and hopefully more profitable for the farmers, for BSI, and for the country.”