By Marvin Cato | HGP Nightly News|
ENMORE, EAST COAST DEMERARA — President Irfaan Ali has invited the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) to take on the management and operation of one of GuySuCo’s remaining sugar estates, framing the offer as an open challenge to demonstrate what union leadership could achieve where the Corporation’s management has struggled to meet production targets.
The President made the call on Tuesday during commemorations marking the 78th anniversary of the Enmore Martyrs — the five sugar workers killed by colonial-era police during a 1948 labour dispute at Enmore Estate on the East Coast Demerara.
The President’s Challenge
Speaking at the event, Ali invited GAWU to take up what he described as a management opportunity.
“We also invited the union — if you would like to take up the mantle of management — to take one of their estates and make it a model,” the President said. “We give you that challenge openly to take one of their estates and to manage it.”
He added: “Do not shy away from the opportunity. We are here to work with you.”
The Production Record
The invitation comes against a backdrop of sustained underperformance at GuySuCo, despite significant state investment. Between 2020 and 2026, the Government injected over G$40 billion into the Corporation — directed primarily toward reopening closed estates and upgrading factory infrastructure.
Production figures over the same period tell a difficult story. Output reached only 88,000 tonnes in 2020, fell to 58,000 tonnes in 2021, dropped further to 47,000 tonnes in 2022, and stood at 59,600 tonnes as recently as 2025. Management of the Corporation has changed hands more than once during this period.
The President defended the scale of investment, saying the injection of public funds was necessary to prevent the industry’s collapse.
“If government had not done so, the industry would have been dead,” he said, adding that the Government would continue to support the sugar sector while searching for different formulas to ensure its long-term survival.
President Ali has publicly warned on more than one occasion that improvements in GuySuCo’s performance are necessary and that consequences for underperformance would follow. Those consequences have not materialised to date, as HGP Nightly News has reported previously.
Mechanisation Plans
Among the steps being considered to address an acute labour shortage in the industry, the President said mechanised cane harvesting is being explored. He noted that up to 44% of GuySuCo’s lands have been converted to accommodate machinery, and that vehicles previously used to inspect fields and apply fertiliser are being replaced by drones to save time and reduce costs.
GAWU’s Response
GAWU President Seepaul Narine — who also serves as a People’s Progressive Party / Civic (PPP/C) Member of Parliament — responded positively to the President’s announcement, framing the current government effort to rescue the industry as historic.
GAWU welcomed what it described as a G$16.4 billion “full rescue mission” for the sugar industry, and said it would hold management’s feet to the fire to ensure that taxpayer funds translate into real improvements for workers and estates.
The union had not, at the time of publication, formally accepted or responded in detail to the specific management challenge the President issued at Tuesday’s event.
