7 News Belize

Cane Farmers Meeting to Accept Contract Historically Short
posted (January 19, 2015)
Today's signing was made possible by a breakthrough meeting yesterday at the Esecuela Secundaria Technica Mexico in San Roman Village, Corozal District. After going back and forth on the commercial agreement - the cane farmers finally, resolutely, and swiftly agreed to sign the agreement - the same one they had emphatically rejected two weeks earlier. What changed? Well, almost everything - and the farmers made it clear they had no time to waste. 7News was there:..

Daniel Ortiz reporting
Once again, the between 600-800 members of the Belize Sugar Cane Farmer Association gathered at la Escuela Secundaria Technica Mexico for the 3rd Special General Meeting in a row.

Knowing that the press would be there, some farmers brought Posters in Spanish, which translated, say "Long Live The BSCFA, Out with the Radicals".

At the head of the meeting, 14 of the 18 branch directors sat with Committee Chair Ezequiel Cansino.

He called meeting to order a few minutes after 10, where the General membership resolved to have the one-item agenda move forward with no interruptions and no unnecessary speaking.

Their Association's CEO, Oscar Alonzo, outlined that although 3,088 members - the majority of the BSCFA membership - already gave their support to sign the compromise agreement the Branch level, the factory owners, BSI/ASR, required a resolution from a general membership vote.

It was one of the shortest meetings ever. We were caught off guard when it ended abruptly only 20 minutes in.

The cane farmers who were there gave almost unanimous support to sign, which now directs the Committee of Management to formally request a signed commercial agreement with the millers.

Ezequiel Cansino - Chairman of COM, BSCFA
"We just came to get an approval from the membership to go ahead and sign the agreement with BSI. We came straight to the point and the cane farmers responded as positive as we expected, we don't have anything else to do today, but only inform BSI and try our best to sign as soon as possible tomorrow."

Mike Rudon, CH5
"You think that what happen here today was the best thing for farmers and the industry?"

Oscar Alonzo - CEO, BSCFA
"Well, it's what was necessary. The farmers need to start the crop and sometimes in any negotiation process, you win some, you lose some. This is not the final thing. Farmers will need to continue to work with BSI and if we need to retreat a bit to advance further in the future, I think that is something noble, I think that is something that is natural."

Ezequiel Cansino
"What happen in the following meeting is that a very heavy campaign was done to not accept that agreement and if we analyze correctly what we saw, all those people that came and voted against this agreement, didn't come here today. We can say that indeed it was a campaign that was done and the same people that accept it today are the same people that accepted the agreement the first time. So, I believe that these people are well aware of what they say and they have accepted that the first time. It's the same people that we have today."

The next hurdle is to try and mill as much of the 1.477 million tonnes of cane product sitting in the ground.

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