B.S.C.F.A. Urges Members Not to Deliver Cane
Shawn Chavarria
And while B.S.I. wants all cane farmers to deliver cane, the B.S.C.F.A. is urging its members not to. The BSCFA wrote to Prime Minister John Briceño to “exert his authority as maximum leader of the country of Belize, to request from B.S.I. to sign a Commercial Agreement with B.S.C.F.A. for this crop year 2023/2024 with the same terms as last year since it would only be formalizing its already public Open Agreement offer to B.S.C.F.A. members”. B.S.C.F.A. is proposing a one-year commercial agreement that includes making B.S.I. the conveyor of Fairtrade Premium paid by Tate and Lyle Sugars. This was rejected by B.S.I. B.S.C.F.A. is also accusing the B.S.I. of attempting to break up the association. Chavarria says this is not the case.
Shawn Chavarria, Director of Finance, B.S.I.
“This is not an attempt to break the BSCFA. If anything, it’s an arrangement to try to break the deadlock because we are at a deadlock. And rather than the parties reaching closer to signing a long term agreement, we are actually, the gap is widening because the BSCFA keeps putting new conditions. Now they want us to pay two years of Fairtrade, the mill to do that. They also want us to become the conveyor of the fair trade premium. For the past 18 months, we’ve said no. There was an attempt by the government to introduce legislation earlier this year to force BSI to pay the Fairtrade Premium. And we have challenged that legislation. That’s a case that’s going to be heard next year. So in our view, this isn’t about trying to break the BSCFA apart, but trying to find a way for there to be a smooth start of the crop to facilitate the members of the B-S-C-F-E to deliver their cane because the alternative was to start without them, which for us would have been even more problematic. So for us, this is a middle ground to be able to start the prop and should and when the BSCFA sign an agreement then their members will simply fold into that whatever commercial agreement the BSCFA signs in terms of the being members of the BSCFA. From our standpoint, they will continue to be members of the BSCFA and simply that they are making the decision to deliver their cane and to sell it to BSI. But in terms of how we will receive it, they will continue to be members of the BSCFA. The court has found that you do not need to belong to an association to be able to sell your sugar cane to the mill. That provision in the Sugar Act was found to be unconstitutional that you are forced to belong to an association. That’s not the case. So what we’re doing is fully in compliance with the law and fully in compliance with the Constitution of Belize. What we’re seeing is that there is a sense of fatigue that is taking place. That we seem to be stuck in this Groundhog Day scenario where we give these same interviews the same time of the year. We’re talking to the same people every single year around this time and we just think it’s time to move on. There’s really no reason why we shouldn’t have a long term agreement with the BSCFA in place. Everything, in a sense, is aligned for us to have to be able to start smoothly to take advantage of these good prices. We recently launched AgroPro. That’s our attempt to try to work directly with farmers to improve their productivity so that they can see higher returns. I mean, we’re living up to our commitments as a company. And I think it’s really time that others do their part to try to move this industry forward.”
The United Democratic Party this evening called for the immediate intervention of the Government of Belize. A release from the Opposition says that it is “deeply concerned that once again the breadbasket of the north is under threat as we face another likely delay in commencement of the sugar cane crop season due to an ongoing impasse”.
