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Sugar Crop In Peril, No Final Agreement, NTUCB Urges Farmers Not To Sign
posted (December 19, 2014)
When we left you last night, the signing of the final agreement between BSI and the Cane Farmers had been delayed by confusion over controversial clause the ASR/BSI seemed to have slipped in there.

It involves a body called the Sugar Cane Production Committee which the factory wants to replace with a new entity called the Harvest and Delivery Control Unit. The Production committee is a Government entity which oversees which cane is accepted and which isn't. But according to the farmers, BSI's proposed Harvest and Delivery Control Unit would have more influence from the factory owners and not enough oversight from the Government to protect the farmers from being victims and their cane unfairly rejected.

So, it was rejected at the negotiation stage. And the farmers say that BSI then slipped it back in. But BSI says it was always there, it was never taken out, and it's just that no one was paying proper attention to it.

BSI said it is willing to amend it - but the farmers want it out. While that was hanging unresolved..

literally overnight, things took a decidedly different course, fuelled in no small part by an inflammatory statement coming out of the National Trade Union Congress of Belize. Last night at 10:30, the union issued a bold statement saying, quote:

The NTUCB says to the Directors of the Belize Sugar Cane Farmers Association, all eighteen strong, DO NOT SIGN any agreement."

It goes on:

"NTUCB calls on the farmers to wake up and denounce the trickery that has been played on them and to realize it is not too late to stop the signing of this oppressive and economically crippling agreement."

That strident denunciation followed up by a blast text saying pretty much the same thing, changed the temperature of the dialogue completely - and culminated this afternoon in the voluntary shutdown of BSI offices and preparation for a riot - which did not happen. But that's just an indication of how tense it got. Belizario Carballo explained:..

Diodi Novelo, member, Cane Farmer Negociating Team
"BSI is not playing clean. BSI want to introduce that AGCU for them to be in control of the situation in delivering of cane and to me if I was there in office with them I would put my point that this is the clear opportunity to tell BSI that we are going back to square one, we are going to start to negotiate because you are not playing clean. You have already entered something we have already rejected."

Audrey Matura-Shepherd
"Decisions of BSI/ASR and Belize Cane Farmers Association gravely impacts our employees first and foremost. But more importantly it impacts the nation. People have not been keeping track of this issue and where we are right now is going to be a grave disservice and injustice if these farmers go ahead and sign this agreement with BSI/ASR. I don't know how much you all were updated yesterday with the trickery they tried on them when they tried to insert a clause. That trickery is not only an insult to the Cane Farmers Association, but it's an insult to this nation because the law is clear as to who could be the entity that regulates the quality of cane. We realize that they are taking advantage of the farmers. This is the rest. If nobody can't see it, then we will show them it. Why pressure them into an agreement that makes them give up the ownership of their cane?"

Daniel Ortiz
"How do you answer to the criticism that many hand spoil the pot and Mr. Chris Coye, their attorney is already there and you are inserting yourself?"

Audrey Matura-Shepherd
"Let me tell you, we are not even hands, we are whole body in and we cannot spoil the pot. I am not here as the legal representative of anyone. I am here as the National Trade Union Congress and as the president of CWU and thank God yes I do have a law degree, so the b!@#*t on the farmers, when they try to insert a new clause cannot happen."

Ezequiel Cansino - Chair, Com of Mgmt, BSCFA
"The proposal asking them to do that. They gave us part of it but it was not completely and today we decide that this will be the last chance that we will be sending the proposal to include the SCPC as the regulating body and if that doesn't happen, well, a decision will have to be made and we have to come back again and decide what will be the next step."

Mike Rudon, Ch5
"People are saying that if negotiations fail at this point, they want the BSCFA, the cane farmers to go back to square one, to go right back to the beginning. Are you in agreement with that?"

Ezequiel Cansino
"If that is the demand of the people, then we have to do what they are demanding us to do."

Alfred Ortega, Member, Negotiating Team
"I would really want to ask the support of the farmers moving forward not to support the signing of this agreement in the way it is."

BSI was supposed to have held a press conference to explain their side of the story, but when we showed up, we were informed that it had been cancelled, with no explanation offered.

Just before news time however, BSI's Chief Financial Officer, Belizario Carballo, called us back and granted us a phone interview in which he explained what happened with the supposed offending clause in the final draft.

Belizario Carballo - CFO, BSI
"In that draft agreement we introduced no new change. The draft agreement that was sent on Monday was based on the last draft agreement that we presented to the BSCFA on the 9th October, which was the last date when we sat to negotiate and so that was the last agreement that we had before we met with the Prime Minister. And so, once we met with the Prime Minister we updated that draft with the three points that were agreed, that was surfaced as points of contention and we submitted that revised draft to the BSCFA."

Daniel Ortiz
"What happened to the harvest and delivery?"

Belizario Carballo - CFO, BSI
"The harvest and delivery as were reflected in the draft that we presented to the BSCFA from the 9th October were identical to the draft that we currently presented. This notion that somehow BSI updated something and try to slip it by someone is really untrue and I think it needs to be clarified. What has occurred is that we are now down to one point of disagreement."

Daniel Ortiz
"Persons who have always disagreed with this compromise agreement are now agitating for the farmers to take this deal off the table completely and reject the games that you've made to go back to Square one."

Belizario Carballo - CFO, BSI
"We are well aware of the misrepresentations and the distractions that are being introduced by those who are seeking to frustrate and stall the process of reaching an agreement. As you indicate those elements exists and we are well aware of it and we have heard those elements in the media this week and over the next week we will seek to clarify those points in more details, but for now, we have taken out a press release this evening to address fundamentally from our point of view how the process has evolved. The process is taking some time."

This evening, BSI sent out a press release which says, quote,

"in a considered effort to finalize an agreement, BSI further revised its position on this matter in the revised Agreement submitted to the BSCFA today….BSI accepts that the process and criteria for cane rejection would be developed and agreed between the parties in consultation with the SCPC. This provides for the SCPC to administer the cane rejection procedures agreed to by the parties. BSI has in no instance tried to undermine the SCPC."

We wait and see whether that will be enough to appease the farmers. As it stands right now, no agreement has been signed - and no one knows when one will be signed - much less when the season will open.

And while that matter lies unresolved, in the undercard, we note that the Government has openly clashed with the NTUCB. A release issued from GOB this morning referred to the NTUCB's inflammatory press release.

It says, quote "GOB derides as paternalistic and arrogant in the extreme, the NTUCB release regarding the agreement reached between the BSCFA and ASR/BSI. The NTUCB release characterizes the agreement as oppressive and something foisted on cane farmers with the connivance of GOB. This is notwithstanding the fact that the agreement was openly debated and approved by BSCFA Directors, its Negotiating Committee, and Its General Assembly. It is therefore incredibly patronizing and just plain wrong for the NTUCB to think and say that it knows better than the farmers; and…in effect condemn, a decision of the BSCFA taken in the full exercise of their judgment and democratic determination as to what was in their best interest." End quote.

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