G.O.B. Wants to Ensure Protection of Sugar Cane Farmers

Jose Abelardo Mai

But what law exists that determines that the miller must compensate all farmers after selling sugar to Fairtrade at a premium price? Agriculture Minister Jose Abelardo Mai says that at this time there is none. It’s a matter that came up in cabinet on Tuesday.

Jose Abelardo Mai, Ministry of Agriculture

“The problem that we have in the country is that there is no law that binds Fairtrade premiums. There is no binding law that obliges ASR/B.S.I. or Tate and Lyle to pay the farmers even though they have sold the sugar at premium prices as the farmers believe is the case. So what do we do next, if I come to you and say to you I need your permission to raise funds abroad to send your child to university and then I do so, you authorise me to do so, and I raise the funds and take those funds and give that to someone else. I will leave that for you to decide what you will refer to that as. But this is where we are. There are a number of conditions that Miss Julia Clarke is requesting of the farmers saying we can rearrange, but if you comply with A, B, C, D, E and F and the farmers believe that they have complied with everything that is requested by FLOCERT, which is the policing agency of Fairtrade. We are consulting with other international people to see how it is that it works in other countries. See, Belize is a unique place because the farmers do not sell sugar; the farmers sell sugar cane to B.S.I.  B.S.I. then sells that sugar to Tate and Lyle. But B.S.I. and Tate and Lyle are owned by the same people. And so Tate and Lyle gets the money and then distributes it to the association, but then it is B.S.I. to sold the sugar to Tate and Lyle. That’s why the Fairtrade quantities are given to the country to say alright Belize you have to supply forty thousand tons of Fairtrade sugar to Tate and Lyle. And in that sugar, there is sugar from all four associations.  I do not believe that anybody want their name out there in the media, being dragged as “mal pago” or that you took my stuff and noh pay me fuh it. I think attorneys would refer to it as obtaining by deception. I am not an attorney, I was never good at these things; I am an agronomist. But the legal people would call it all kind of terms. But I agree with you that it does not look good and I think that it has to be addressed. How do we address it is a different matter. And so cabinet has been discussing it for hours and there may be things that we have to do as a government to ensure that the interests of farmers are safeguarded. because today it can be B.S.C.F.A. and tomorrow it may be the other associations and day after tomorrow it could be somebody else. Just as we need to safeguard the interest of the investor in the country, in this case ASR, we need to safeguard the interest of the farmers.”