By LCN Business Desk
Six mid-year reports and three budget speeches answer three questions about the sugar industry: what the State put in, what the industry sent out, and what the money was said to be for. This newspaper reported the single-year figure earlier today; this is the series behind it.
Every figure below is from a government document. None comes from an opposition estimate or an industry critic.
How much has the State actually spent?
More than it budgeted, in four of the last five years.
Each Mid-Year Report sets out the previous year's outturn in Appendix E11, under a GuySuCo memorandum heading, split between current transfers and capital contributions.
| Year | Current | Capital | Total | Budgeted | Against budget |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 3.65 | 3.50 | 7.15 | ||
| 2022 | 5.00 | 5.43 | 10.43 | 6.00 | +74% |
| 2023 | 4.64 | 3.51 | 8.15 | 4.00 | +104% |
| 2024 | 10.29 | 5.22 | 15.51 | 6.00 | +158% |
| 2025 | 5.90 | 7.40 | 13.30 | 13.30 | on budget |
| 2026 revised | 11.40 | 5.00 | 16.40 | 13.40 | +22% |
G$ billions. Source: Appendix E11 of the Mid-Year Reports for 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026.
A note on the source. The first column of Appendix E11 in the Mid-Year Report 2026 is headed "2024 ACTUAL". Its figures are not the 2024 actuals. The Mid-Year Report 2025 gives GuySuCo's 2024 current transfer as G$10,289,812,000; the 2026 report's first column gives G$5,904,000,000, which is the 2025 figure. Across 29 comparable lines of the same appendix, that column matches the 2025 revised estimates closely and the 2024 actuals on none. The 2026 Budget Speech settles it: "in 2025, $13.3 billion was spent in the sector." This report treats that column as 2025.
The pattern runs in two halves. For three years the corporation was budgeted at between G$4 billion and G$6 billion and spent between G$8 billion and G$15.5 billion. Then in 2025 the budget was set at G$13.3 billion, and G$13.3 billion was what was spent.
That is not a small correction. The 2025 budget was more than double the 2024 budget, and it was the first year in the series that the allocation matched the outturn.
2026 has moved again. The budget was G$13.4 billion and the Mid-Year Report revises it to G$16.4 billion, the whole of that G$3 billion increase falling on the operating line rather than on capital.
What share of the national budget is that?
Between 1.0 and 1.9 per cent, and the direction is down.
| Year | GuySuCo | National expenditure | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 7.15 | 386.98 | 1.85% |
| 2022 | 10.43 | 592.86 | 1.76% |
| 2023 | 8.15 | 803.47 | 1.02% |
| 2024 | 15.51 | 1,162.89 | 1.33% |
| 2025 | 13.30 | 1,311.98 | 1.01% |
| 2026 revised | 16.40 | 1,573.97 | 1.04% |
G$ billions. Source: as above, line 1.0, total expenditure and net lending.
Guyana's half-year accounts showed overall growth of 33.3 per cent this year while the forecast for everything except oil was cut, which is the context for a budget rising this fast. This is the figure that reconciles two things people say about sugar and assume to be in conflict. The cash has more than doubled, by a factor of 2.29. The share has nearly halved. Both are true, because national expenditure over the same six years rose more than four-fold, from G$387 billion to a revised G$1.574 trillion.
So sugar costs more than it did and matters less to the budget than it did. Anyone arguing that the subvention is crushing the Treasury is working from the cash figure. Anyone arguing it is trivial is working from the share. The documents support both sentences and neither argument.
What has the industry produced?
Less, in every year, than in the year the programme began.
| Year | Tonnes | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 88,868 | Budget Speech 2021 |
| 2022 | 47,049 | Budget Speech 2024 |
| 2023 | 60,204 | Budget Speech 2024 |
| 2024 | 47,103 | Bank of Guyana |
| 2025 | 59,600 | Bank of Guyana and Budget Speech 2026 |
| 2026 | 70,401 target | Mid-Year Report, revised |
The 2021 Budget Speech described 2020 in these terms: the sector "contracted by 3.7 percent, with production falling to a low of 88,868 tonnes", and said that when the administration took office "sugar production had plummeted to its lowest level ever".
The level described as the lowest ever has not been reached again in any year since.
Cane is exposed to the same weather that cut Guyana's rice crop by 37 per cent in the last comparable El Nino. The best of the six years was 2023, at 60,204 tonnes, 32.3 per cent below the 2020 figure. The revised 2026 target of 70,401 tonnes is still 20.8 per cent below it.
How close has production come to its targets?
Twice a target near 100,000 tonnes has been set. Neither has been met.
The 2024 Budget Speech projected growth of 66.1 per cent and said "the sector is expected to produce 100,000 metric tonnes of sugar in 2024". Production was 47,103 tonnes, not growth but a fall from the 60,204 tonnes of 2023, in the same year spending reached its highest point in the series.
The 2026 Budget Speech projected growth of 67.9 per cent "with a target of 100,041 tonnes". By September the Mid-Year Report had revised it to 70,401 tonnes, a cut of 29,640 tonnes, or 29.6 per cent, inside eight months.
What has it earned?
Less each year, across the three years the Bank of Guyana's published table covers.
| Sugar exports | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Volume, tonnes | 35,227 | 25,848 | 34,237 |
| Earnings, US$ millions | 24.9 | 19.4 | 18.1 |
| Average price, US$ a tonne | 749.41 | 529.37 |
Source: Bank of Guyana Annual Report 2025, Table VII.
Earnings fell in each year, including 2025, when production rose 26.5 per cent and export volume rose 32.5 per cent. The average export price fell 29.4 per cent, in the year the EUR 98 a tonne preference that was the region's commercial edge in Europe began to be withdrawn. These are exports only; domestic sales are additional and are not in that table.
At the official mid-rate of G$208.50, 2025's US$18.1 million is about G$3.8 billion, against G$13.3 billion spent that year.
What did the government say each year?
A consistent account of recovery, with the figure attached to it changing shape.
2021. The Budget Speech allocated "$2 billion for critical capital works at GUYSUCO", in a passage that cited "the importance of sugar in the domestic economy, and the manner in which this sector affects overall socio-economic conditions in rural Berbice and rural Demerara". It said that when the administration entered office "sugar production had plummeted to its lowest level ever".
2023. On G$4 billion for the Albion packaging plant and the expansion of Blairmont, Senior Minister in the Office of the President with responsibility for Finance Dr Ashni Singh said: "The sugar industry has been in a state of neglect and disrepair for far too long. Fields and factories were left abandoned, with billions of dollars in machinery and equipment left to deteriorate." The same announcement put rehiring at 1,479 dismissed workers, against more than 7,000 laid off, and said that since returning to office the administration had invested over G$10 billion in plants and equipment.
2024. On G$6 billion, and in a Budget Speech that set a 100,000 tonne target for the year, Singh said: "Over 4,600 workers were rehired, bringing the total employment to over 8,100 employees across the industry." Planting had risen 52 per cent in 2023, to 4,020 hectares from 2,640, and packaged sugar had gone from 48 per cent of output to 54 per cent. A further 7,100 hectares were to be converted for mechanised harvesting in 2024.
2025. On G$13.3 billion, the stated purpose was "to continue to support and rehabilitate the sugar industry", with 3,000 hectares converted, mechanisation, field equipment and over 17 kilometres of all-weather road.
2026. The Budget Speech reports "direct economic support to over 5,200 severed workers" and employment of "more than 8,300 persons".
Two series run through those statements. Rehiring: 1,479 by 2023, over 4,600 by 2024. Total employment: over 8,100 in January 2024, more than 8,300 by 2026. Spending roughly doubled between those two employment figures.
The 5,200 figure in the 2026 speech describes severed workers given direct economic support, which is not the same measure as the 4,600 rehired in 2024, and the two should not be read as a single run.
What did the money buy?
Estates, machinery and jobs, which the documents set out and which belong in the account.
The 2026 Budget Speech records that over five years the government reopened the Rose Hall Estate, upgraded field and factory infrastructure at Albion, Blairmont, Rose Hall and Uitvlugt, shifted the sales mix from bulk sugar towards higher value products, part of the same agro-processing export push the government has taken to Doha, and provided direct economic support to over 5,200 severed workers. It puts employment in the sector at more than 8,300 persons.
In 2025 the Albion packaging plant began operating. Two mechanical harvesters were bought, more than 100 cane punts rehabilitated along with the Blairmont wharf and rotary sugar dryer drums, and over five kilometres of access road laid. Rose Hall produced 1,031 tonnes in its first crop back, in the second crop of 2023.
For 2026 the stated programme is over 3,000 hectares converted for mechanised harvesting, three sugar boilers replaced, five cane harvesters, a billet cane conveyor at Albion, dryers for Rose Hall and Uitvlugt, and feeder tables.
What do the six years show?
Spending that outran its budget three years running, output below where it started, and earnings falling.
GuySuCo is not the only state enterprise drawing on the budget: the government has also funded a state bottled water plant while coastal supply stood at 80 per cent, and across the region Suriname pays its national airline up to US$2.2 million a month on accounts years out of date. The State has put G$71 billion into sugar across the six years on these figures. It has reopened an estate, built packaging plants and kept more than 8,300 people in work. It has not yet returned the industry to the production level its own 2021 Budget Speech called the lowest ever recorded, at a time when CARICOM's agriculture ministers are asking the region to buy Caribbean.
The one figure that would settle the argument appears in none of these documents: the unit cost of producing a tonne of sugar. Without it a reader can see what goes in and what comes out, and cannot see the distance between them.
What the title card shows
Every data point on the article's title card, in text.
* G$6.00 billion and G$15.51 billion. The 2024 budget for GuySuCo and the 2024 outturn, a difference of 158 per cent. Source: Mid-Year Reports 2024 and 2025, Appendix E11. * G$7.15 billion and G$16.40 billion. Spending in 2021 and the revised figure for 2026, a rise of 2.29 times. Source: Mid-Year Reports 2022 and 2026. * 1.85 per cent and 1.04 per cent. GuySuCo's share of total national expenditure in 2021 and in 2026 on the revised figures. Calculated from the same appendix, line 1.0. * 4.07 times. The rise in total national expenditure over the same period, from G$386.98 billion to a revised G$1,573.97 billion. Source: as above. * 88,868 tonnes. Production in 2020, described in the 2021 Budget Speech as a low and as the lowest level ever. Not matched in any year since. * 60,204 tonnes. The highest production of the six years, in 2023, which is 32.3 per cent below 2020. * 100,000 tonnes. The target set for 2024, against 47,103 produced. Source: Budget Speech 2024, paragraph 5.5. * US$18.1 million. Sugar export earnings in 2025, down from US$24.9 million in 2023. Source: Bank of Guyana Annual Report 2025, Table VII.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much has Guyana spent on GuySuCo since 2021?
About G$71 billion in total: G$7.15 billion in 2021, G$10.43 billion in 2022, G$8.15 billion in 2023, G$15.51 billion in 2024, G$13.30 billion in 2025 and a revised G$16.40 billion in 2026.
Is the sugar subvention taking a growing share of the budget?
No. It has fallen from 1.85 per cent of total national expenditure in 2021 to 1.04 per cent on the revised 2026 figures, even though the cash amount has more than doubled, because national expenditure rose more than four-fold over the same period.
Has the spending stayed within budget?
Not in four of the last five years. The outturn exceeded the budget by 74 per cent in 2022, 104 per cent in 2023 and 158 per cent in 2024. 2025 came in exactly on budget, and 2026 has been revised 22 per cent above budget at the half year.
Is production recovering?
It has risen and fallen: 47,049 tonnes in 2022, 60,204 in 2023, 47,103 in 2024 and 59,600 in 2025. All are below the 88,868 tonnes of 2020.
What does sugar earn Guyana?
Sugar export earnings were US$24.9 million in 2023, US$19.4 million in 2024 and US$18.1 million in 2025. Those are exports only; domestic sales are additional and are not published in that table.