Sugar Industry Inquiry Report in Progress After Public Hearings Conclude

Following the public hearings by the Commission of Inquiry (COI) into the modernization of Belize’s sugar industry, the commissioners are preparing a final report. The hearings took place between August 27 and 31 before the commissioner who have since returned to their respective countries. The Government of Belize’s Lead Coordinator for the COI, Hugh O’Brien, told Love News that the commissioners already have a format for the report and are sorting through information provided by the various organizations that testified at the hearings.

Hugh O’Brien, Lead Coordinator, Commission of Inquiry, GOB: “They have already put together the structure of the report that they are going to prepare and submit to the Government of Belize. So the work continues now as commissioners return to their country. They were not…. we had discussed whether there should be the need for a third mission and we are still in that phase of our discussion right now, but it is clear that for the work to be completed adequately, properly on time, it is the view of the commissioners and the coordinating team which I am leading that the commissioners will be looking forward to a third trip to come back to Belize around the middle of October to try to work on for two weeks to work on finalizing their report, arriving at consensus amongst themselves on the recommendations and to try to submit a draft report to the Government of Belize towards the end of October, early November and give the government of Belize a chance to review, revise, and make some input as well. And if there’s any modifications required on the report for that to then be taken on board by the commissioners and in so doing that the commission of inquiry would meet their November 30th deadline for the submission of the final report.”

O’Brien added that the four cane farmer associations that appeared before the COI, provided a wealth of information in their written submissions and testimonies.

Hugh O’Brien, Lead Coordinator, Commission of Inquiry, GOB: “The Cane Farmers Associations have been very, very open with the commissioners. They have made written submissions to the commissioners, to the commission, and in their appearance to the commission during the public hearings they started off each of the presenters started off making an oral presentation on their issues that they have in the industry, what are some of their views in terms of what reform and transformations are required for the industry to be more sustainable and more mutually beneficial to both farmers and millers as well as to the country of Belize and they also raised concerns about various issues that plague the production of sugarcane from matters to do with land tenure, to the cost of inputs, the cost of fuel regulation, relationship between the farmers themselves and their associations, relationship between the different because there are now four different sugarcane farmers the relationship between those associations, the partnership between the farmers association and the millers. In the case of the north there are a lot more issues because there are over 5,000 cane farmers and there are four associations. While in the West, there’s only about 15 commercial farmers and the company Santander produces or either own or rent and to a large extent is in charge of about 75% of the sugarcane production in the western part of the country.”

Prior to the public hearings, the commissioners conducted site visits with the cane farmer associations, Santander Sugar in the Cayo District, and Belize Sugar Industries in Orange Walk.  The Commission is made up of Wayne Piper as the Chair with the Directors being Simon Gibbons, Robert Mariette, Vinod Ramharai, Jeffery Joseph, Andrew Church as well as the technical advisor, Krity Neermul and Secretary, Lorena Posada.