Belize Sugar to CARICOM – the Challenges

And so while sugar experts and farmers are happy about the boost in this year’s sugar cane milled and sugar extracted, it also brings into the focus the much needed market for this sugar.  The Ministries of Agriculture and Trade and Commerce, along with its sugar industry partners of A.S.R./B.S.I., Santander and other regional bodies such as the Sugar Association of the Caribbean and the  CARICOM’S Council for Trade and Economic Development have been working to secure the CARICOM market for all sugars.  As we’ve reported over the years, there have been several challenges for Belize to secure this market.  Today, the Belize Sugar Industries Limited’s Communications and Government Affairs representative, William Neal, shared more about some of those issues.

William Neal

William Neal, Communications & Government Affairs, Belize Sugar Industries Limited

“We need to penetrate new markets and CARICOM becomes important. We have been working with the Ministry of Trade, the Ministry of Agriculture and the Government of Belize to secure that market. Why? Because there are some discrepancies within the market, for example, even under the revised Treaty of Chaguaramas, Brown Sugar should not be coming in but we see, in fact, that it is coming in from places like Guatemala, Honduras and Colombia. We want to correct that within our CARICOM market, so we are advocating at COTED to have some of those changes. We also know that some people are saying that they need a certain quality of sugar that they don’t really need in terms of goods produced. So, we are looking again at the substitutability of white refined and plantation white sugar. There is a lot that needs to be done but we feel that we feel that we are putting in all the good building blocks for sugar to do well. All producers in the Caribbean have traditionally gone to the EU because the prices are so good but in every other trading block, you consume your own sugar and that is your first market. Without your preferential prices then it behooves us as a nation to look at that, otherwise what are the benefits that we can say we receive from CARICOM and market share is one of those things, especially for sugar, for citrus and for so many of our agricultural products.”