Strike Cripples Rose Hall Estate

Sugar workers attached to Rose Hall Estate took strike action crippling field and factory operations at the Estate since yesterday (November 22, 2009).

The almost 3,000 person workforce were aghast when Rose Hall Estate late last Saturday morning (November 21, 2009) withdrew a day’s pay earned by the workers for having produced sugar equivalent to or over the week’s Weekly Production Incentive (WPI) target of 1,350 tonnes.

During last week each day’s production as written on the Estate’s Notice Board was as follows:-

14th November – 198 tonnes
15th November - 181 tonnes
16th November - 106 tonnes
17th November - 225 tonnes
18th November - 201 tonnes
19th November - 214 tonnes
20th November - 227 tonnes
Total                - 1,352 tonnes

Who is/are from the hierarchy of Guysuco is responsible for the withdrawal of the day’s pay?

Often workers are criticized to restoring to industrial action. The Guyana Sugar Corporation Inc (Guysuco) always seeks to exonerate itself from creating, aiding and abetting the conditions for workers to embark on industrial action/s.

Here is a classic case of manipulation by the Corporation to deprive almost 3,000 workers of about G$6M of hard earned incentive.

Rose Hall Estate as at November 21, 2009 produced 33,855 or 91.5 per cent of its production target (36,993 tonnes) for 2009. The industry is struggling to meet its revised target of 248,668 tonnes sugar for this year, having produced 224,571 tonnes as at November 21, 2009.