Plan to secure rice industry prepared for EU funding
Stabroek News
November 19, 2002
The government has drafted a strategic plan for the development of the rice industry to be submitted to the European Development Fund for financing.
At the opening of the National Consultation on the Rice Action Plan for Guyana held at the Cara Inn yesterday, Minister of Agriculture Navin Chandarpal told farmers that the plan was a spin-off from a diagnostic study conducted last year. It points to a number of critical issues which need to be addressed in the areas of cultivation, post-harvesting and marketing.
Around 40 million euros will be available to fund Guyana's rice plan and that of neighbouring Suriname.
Chandarpal said the internal approach to developing the industry has been given a boost by the offer of support by the European Union to the region's rice sector.
But he warned that the external challenges were great: "It is one that is taking place at a number of forums. In the areas where we have been benefiting from preferential treatment we see that it has gradually been eroding and we have to look ahead to a period when we would not be the beneficiary of that type of treatment and we have to plunge into total and open competition and in that state we have to look at this plan to improve our competitiveness."
He said the industry could improve its competitiveness by dealing with input factors and said drainage and irrigation (D&I) was probably the most essential of all of the back up services that are needed for the sector. He said D&I has always made the difference between a successful or failed crop, adding that the physical situation requires the D&I system to be extremely efficient if the industry is to fully benefit. He said repairs to the system over the last ten years have allowed for significant increases in acreage but many areas remain to be fixed. Chandarpal urged farmers to work closer together in order to take advantage of the draft plan's community-based programmes. He called on them to find ways to pool their resources where finances were limited and he recognised the recent initiative by the Rice Producers' Association in establishing a seed paddy facility in Essequibo. He said through such projects farmers can have the seeds prepared efficiently and in sufficient quantity and variety.
The overall goal of the three-stage strategic plan is to create an integrated and sustainable rice industry which can produce, process and competitively market high quality rice.
The objective of the first phase of the plan which deals with rice production and international competition is to increase rice production and productivity to the point where Guyana becomes internationally competitive.
It aims to create conditions whereby rice farmers will have regular access to appropriate modern technologies and methods for efficient rice production.
The industry hopes to establish systems to operate and maintain drainage and irrigation infrastructure in a sustainable manner, and to efficiently provide quality seed paddy of appropriate varieties to meet national demand.
The plan states that the rice industry intends to create systems that provide necessary support services to rice farmers in a sustainable manner.
The second phase of the plan is concerned with improving the post-harvest handling system to the point where rice quality is maintained or improved and quantity losses are reduced to the minimum. Under this phase the industry hopes to lower post-harvest losses from drying, cleaning, storage and transport to acceptable levels. Further, the industry intends to maximise recovery during milling, producing a marketable product at a competitive price. This means a 50% increase in the whole grain yield of acceptable quality rice by 2005.
The industry also hopes to increase profit margins in this phase by improving management of post-harvest systems and adding value to rice and its by-products where feasible. The third stage of the plan deals with creating the conditions for Guyana's rice to be competitive in all of its targeted markets. In this phase the industry hopes to create a system that would regularly provide stakeholders with the decision-making information they require to function. An inter-disciplinary rice lobbying body will also be set up to effectively project the competitive advantages of Guyana's rice. (Nigel Williams)
