Workers of state-owned sugar mills announce protests against shutdown

Workers of 15 state-owned sugar mills and sugarcane farmers have announced protests against the closure of six of the mills amid the threshing season.

They will demonstrate by staging a two-hour strike daily until Dec 15 from Monday if the government does not withdraw its decision to close the mills.

They have also threatened fresh protests if their demand is not met by the time.

Bangladesh Sugar Industry Corporation Workers and Employees Federation, and Bangladesh Sugar Mill Sugarcane Farmers Federation made the announcements at a press conference at Dhaka Reporters Unity on Saturday.

The state-owned mills begin threshing on Oct 15 every year, but this time they are starting the operation on Dec 15 after a delay caused by indecision and other reasons. Now according to the government decision, threshing will not start at the six mills when the others resume operation.

Bangladesh Sugar and Food Industries Corporation or BSFIC informed the mills about the decision recently citing mounting losses.

Production at Pabna Sugar Mill, Shyampur Sugar Mill, Panchagarh Sugar Mill, Setabganj Sugar Mill, Rangpur Sugar Mill and Kushtia Sugar Mill will remain shut until further notice in line with the decision.

The sugarcanes cultivated for these mills will be taken to other nearby mills for threshing, the government said.

Majharul Haque Prodhan, president of the farmers’ federation, said the farmers will stop cultivating sugarcane if the mills get closed. “And the mills will be shut down permanently if there is no sugarcane. Thousands of workers will lose jobs.

“We can’t let this happen. A mill never reopens once it is closed,” he said.

Majharul alleged a certain quarter was misinterpreting the losses at the sugar mills to the government because they want to make a profit from the closure.

Shahjahan Ali Badshah, general secretary of the federation, alleged some officials took the decision to close the mills in order to create chaos in the sugar industry.

“We would not have cultivated sugarcane if they had revealed the plan a year ago,” he said.

With the threshing season delayed, sugarcanes have gotten dry and lost sugar, Badshah said. “The farmers are facing losses.”

BSFIC Chairman Sanat Kumar Saha said production at the mills had been accruing losses for a long time for several reasons, including the declining production capacity of sugar mills. Therefore, the factories are being shuttered for now as part of a push to “reform and modernise” the industry, he said.

But Masudur Rahman, president of the workers’ federation, said the modernisation must go on with the mills open. “The mills cannot be closed in the name of modernisation,” he said.

On speaking to a few managing directors, it was learned that the letter instructing to stoppage of production at sugar mills did not mention any plans for reform or modernisation. However, they believe losses worth of tens of millions of takas can be prevented by maintaining the current salary structure, even if production is halted.

The state-owned sugar mills have been counting losses of around Tk 10 billion every year due to various reasons, including excess manpower, the deteriorating condition of machineries, shortage of raw materials, mounting interests on long-term bank loans and the suspension of production for about 10 months of the year.

For these reasons, white sugar produced in private refineries is available in the market at Tk 60 to Tk 80 per kg, whereas sugar produced at government mills is priced between Tk 250 and Tk 300 per kg. As such, the debt-ridden factories are also having difficulties settling their debts to sugarcane farmers on time.

In the last few years, the government has been able to alleviate the crises emerging in the threshing season through the subsidies provided by the ministry. But in the last fiscal year, the amount of government subsidies has also dropped.

According to BSFIC, the sugar mills racked up losses of Tk 9.7 billion in fiscal year 2019-20. The accumulated losses in the last five years stood at Tk 39.76 billion.