Labour shortages within the sugarcane farming sector became an issue of the past with the idea to recruit overseas workers to fill in the vacancies.

Permanent Secretary for the Ministry of Sugar – Yogesh Karan says this is an initiative that has worked in a number of other countries.

“We’re still exploring at this stage, we have studied some models and recommendations from the FSC was the Mauritian model, cane cutters were brought from off shore. If you speak to the farmers now, most of them have this issue of shortage of cane cutters.”

For the Sugar Cane Growers Council, it’s an idea they support given the constant challenges of labour shortages during harvesting in addition to ageing farmers.

Council CEO Sundresh Chetty says while the idea is still in its infancy, they would like to see the program up and running by the end of the year.