[File Photo]

Minister for Sugar Charan Jeath Singh says he has been concerned about a lack of incentives and rewards for cane farmers.

Singh says, as a minister, he did not hear of farmers being rewarded for increasing their yield.

However, he says that, as promised, his ministry has for the first time paid over one million dollars to 4,924 farmers.

He adds that these farmers have been rewarded for increasing their cane production last year and are paid five dollars per tonne for the additional cane they delivered against the 2022 season.

Singh says in addition to the five-dollar per-tonne payment made last October to reach $91.38 per tonne for the 2022 season crop, this incentive is yet another promise delivered by the Coalition Government.

Furthermore, the Minister acknowledges the challenges faced by the farmers due to the unavailability of labour and has been making all efforts to identify potential harvesting equipment to be brought in for trial.

The Ministry paid a total of $1,033,262 to 8,336 farmers at $1 per tonne for manual harvesting.

Collectively, these farmers harvested a total of 898,490 metric tons of cane manually.