Sugar Industry “Kill to Mill” Time Far Exceeds Global Standard

Global standards suggest that the time between harvesting and milling sugarcane should not exceed twenty-four hours. This is known as the “kill to mill” time. In Belize, the kill to mill time far exceeds twenty-four hours. There are reports of farmers delivering sugarcane to the mill fifteen days after burning. One commissioner referred to this as unacceptable. He asked B.S.I. what the barriers are to reducing this time. Here is how she responded.

 

Olivia Avilez, Cane Farmers Relations Manager

“There are several barriers, and I will give you an anecdote there. Some of our field workers this year saw canes burn for fifteen days, fifteen days and one of the key issues here is the screen testing or individual cane truck testing does not exist in our industry. As you would know from world international standards, if you cannot individually test a truck, you cannot determine payment for that specific truck or field and so the farmer is not compensated based on cane quality. No human being will do or invest and implement better practices if there is not an incentive. In our case an incentive is the cane payment. We have come from 2010 a TCTS of over twelve tons of cane to one ton of sugar to around ten. We were to eight point seven, nine TCTS which has been good. The farmers have shown generally when they work together the quality of cane can improve and the kill to mill can reduce.”