President Irfaan Ali has doubled down on his administration’s position that sugar remains “vital” to the Region Six economy, signalling yet again that the reopening of the Skeldon Estate remains on the agenda. At a press conference Friday, following an outreach to the region the President said the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP) government intends to keep investing in sugar but is now demanding measurable returns—particularly from the Albion and Rose Hall estates, both of which continue to miss production targets despite billions in state injections.
Ali said that government is working with a team of Indian technical experts to examine reopening options for Skeldon, with plans to produce 37,000 tonnes of sugar at the estate by 2030 and reintegrate private cane farmers. The proposed modernisation includes accelerated field conversion for 100% mechanisation by 2030 and the deployment of multi-spectral imaging drones for precision crop monitoring.
Yet the Skeldon proposal immediately revived questions about the previous Skeldon Sugar Modernisation Programme, one of the most expensive public-sector failures in Guyana’s history. Built under the Jagdeo administration by a Chinese contractor, at a cost IN EXCESSOF US$200 Million, the Skeldon factory never approached its intended capacity and suffered crippling production costs before its eventual closure during the A Partnership for National Unity and Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) tenure. Although reopening Skeldon was one of the PPP/C’s 2020 campaign promises, the estate has remained idle. In 2010, then-President Bharrat Jagdeo warned that if his government’s much-vaunted US$200 million Skeldon sugar factory failed to succeed, “well, the sugar industry is dead.”
Ali Targets Panday- “The Panday syndrome must be removed”
Alongside the estate announcements, President Ali unveiled plans for stricter accountability in Guyana Sugar Corportaion (GuySuCo), including a performance matrix for managers starting next year. In his usual bluff he warned “The Panday syndrome in GuySuCo must be removed… and the Panday syndrome is mismanagement and poor management disguised on the class and fanciful language.”
The comment referenced Vishnu Panday, former GuySuCo estate manager and agriculture director—now a We Invest in Nationhood (WIN) parliamentarian—who was brought in by the government in 2020 to help rehabilitate the industry before he eventually exited over internal disagreements.
Ali has repeatedly said that managers who fail to meet the new performance indicators next year “will be removed.”
Reacting to Ali’s ultimatum, Panday said the President’s expectations are unattainable without a rapid and sweeping overhaul of the industry. He warned that GuySuCo will fail “to deliver the measurable results” demanded unless it achieves near-total mechanisation within the same timeframe.
Drawing on more than four decades in the sector, Panday laid out what he believes are essential reforms:
- Full mechanisation by mid-2027
- Factory overhauls, noting most facilities are nearly 100 years old
- Adequate supplies of critical inputs, including fertiliser and herbicides
- A shift to value-added products, especially plantation white sugar
- Eliminating political interference in management
Panday further accused the PPP/C of lacking sincerity in its promises, pointing to the non-reopening of the Enmore Estate—one of the most efficient in the country before closure.
“Enmore produced for 9 tonnes to 1 tonne. Why close it? This was an estate that was 80% fully mechanised. Yet now it is closed.”
He added that “The PPP/C has no interest in keeping the estates… Come 2026, I, Panday, am saying that the government will close Uitvlugt.”
Panday also said he previously wrote to the Ministry of Agriculture on corruption and financial mismanagement at GuySuCo but received no response that “They are short of critical materials… Why with all the international people he brought in, it could help GuySuCo? He needs to answer that.”
Billions Spent, Same Poor Outcomes
Despite heavy political focus and substantial public investment, GuySuCo continues to fall short of its production targets. Current projections show:
Albion: 5,000 tonnes below target
Blairmont: 44% shortfall due to severe factory reliability problems
Rose Hall: more than 4,600 tonnes below target
Uitvlugt: the only estate expected to marginally surpass its target
The chronic underperformance has fuelled persistent questions about whether the problem is management, ageing infrastructure, political control—or all three.
PPP/C Presided Over the Largest Job Losses in Sugar- ILO study
A 2021 International Labour Organisation (ILO) study provides stark historical context. When the PPP/C took office in 1992, GuySuCo employed 28,081 workers. By the time the party left office in 2015, that number had fallen to 16,927—a loss of 11,154 workers, the largest decline under any administration.
For comparison:
Under Forbes Burnham and Desmond Hoyte- People’s National Congress (PNCe) era- job losses totaled 325.
Under APNU+AFC, losses were 5,160.
The study contradicts the PPP/C’s long-standing narrative that it is the guardian of sugar workers, instead revealing a decades-long decline that deepened significantly during its tenure.
A Sector Still Caught Between Politics and Reality
President Ali insists that sugar remains essential, that recovery is underway, and that “there is no shortcut.” But industry veterans argue that the sector cannot rebound without depoliticisation, capital-heavy modernisation, and a shift in strategy.
The government’s renewed promises—Skeldon reopening, a possible sugar refinery, smarter technologies, new management frameworks—arrive at a time when public confidence is at its lowest and GuySuCo’s performance remains inconsistent at best.
The critical question now is whether this latest wave of commitments represents genuine reinvention—or another cycle of political declarations unmet by technical delivery.
Meanwhile the thousands of sugar workers continue to face instability, and for an industry still wrestlising with its past, the answer will determine whether sugar can truly revive—or whether GuySuCo will remain trapped in a pattern of decline despite billions in public investment.
