GUYANA-LABOUR- Sugar workers to benefit from salary increase

GEORGETOWN, Guyana, Workers in Guyana’s sugar industry have been granted an eight percent increase in salaries and wages.

Speaking during a recent press conference, Vice President Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo said the decision was made during Thursday’s Cabinet meeting.

He told reporters that the Government continues to invest in the sugar industry, which was shut down under the previous administration, placing more than 7,000 sugar workers and their families on the breadline.

Last month, President Dr. Mohamed Irfaan Ali announced the eight percent across-the-board retroactive increase to public servants, teachers, members of the disciplined services, constitutional officeholders, as well as government pensioners.

Adjustments to the salaries of junior ranks of the Police Force, Prison Service, and Fire Service were also announced.

These commitments by the Government fall against the backdrop of a number of other measures implemented since its assumption to office in August 2020, with the aim of improving disposable incomes for public sector employees and Guyanese at large.

These include the payment of a seven percent across-the-board increase in 2021; the restoration of one-month tax-free year-end bonuses to the disciplined services totaling more than GUY$1 billion per annum; an increase of 40 percent in the monthly old-age pension from $20,500 to $28,000, providing a total pension payout of more than $21 billion to senior citizens; an increase of 55 percent in public assistance payments from $9,000 to $14,000 monthly, which provided a total of more than $3 billion in annual income support to the beneficiaries of the program, among other interventions.

Other noteworthy incentives include the restoration of the cash grants to the parents of school-aged children, totaling some $6 billion in direct cash transfers, and an increase in the minimum wage for private sector employees by 36 percent to $60,147, in keeping with the recommendations of the tripartite committee.

The Government had also implemented a number of measures to mitigate the effects of the rise in the cost of living, most notably the removal of the excise tax on fuel, capping freight charges used in calculating import taxes, providing fertilizer and other support to farmers to boost food production, and direct cash transfers to especially vulnerable communities.