In a Press release dated May 23, 2003, the Guyana Rice Producers Association (GRPA) explained that local rice stakeholders were concerned about competition from subsidized rice imported from extra-regional sources, especially the USA, and to a lesser extent, Thailand. These imports result in a 50 per cent loss of market share in the English-speaking Caribbean.

“This is equivalent to losses exceeding US$22M per year - much needed revenue in an industry fighting to provide and promote food security in the region,” the GRPA release noted.

The statement continued: “The regional rice industry faces numerous challenges at this point in time and is further compounded by the recent proposal by the European Commission to undertake a Mid-Term Review (MTR) of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). The stakeholders further opined that if the proposed changes at the MTR of the CAP were implemented, they would lose a significant share of the EU market available to them both in terms of size and price. This, the meeting agreed, would have far reaching negative effects.

“According to the stakeholders a number of initiatives have been put forward to the Council for Trade and Economic Development (COTED) dating back some three years and none of these have been implemented. For example, after six meetings of the COTED over three years, the regional rice standard was approved as a mandatory standard to be implemented between end-April and end-December 2002. To date, no Member State has implemented the standard,” the GRPA release said.

The rice producers’ body also noted that although the regional monitoring mechanism designed to gather information on rice production and trade was implemented since the 13th COTED held in May 2002, Member States continue to disregard their obligation to provide the requisite information to the Secretariat.

“Further, the industry proposed a rice regime in the form of a safeguard mechanism, which is aimed at providing some level of support to the regional industry as a result of competition from heavily subsidized imports from extra-regional sources. After accepting the principle that there is need for such a mechanism to support the industry, delaying tactics are used to stall the implementation of the mechanism. As a matter of fact, it has taken two years to state that the mechanism is WTO-compatible. At present, the Common External Tariff (CET) on rice is set at 25 per cent, whilst on the other hand it is 40 per cent for all agricultural commodities including sugar.”

The release further stated: “Although faced with these problems originating both within and without the Region, the rice producers in Guyana are still optimistic that they will meet the changing needs of the world rice industry. However, it is clear that these challenges will be achieved only if CARICOM embraces a regime of active cooperation. The time for us to act is now, especially since we are involved with negotiations at the level of the WTO, FTAA and ACP/EU. Otherwise, all we would be doing is importing rather than producing, a policy that is fraught with grave consequences for our regional food security.”

The GRPA Press release pointed out that the rice industry is one of the economic cornerstones of Guyana, second to sugar as the most important agricultural activity and one that contributes approximately 13 per cent of the agricultural GDP and 12 per cent of export earnings.