Santander Takes on Sugar Commission of Inquiry

The commission of inquiry into the sugar industry in Belize resumed today with presentations being made by representatives of the Santander Sugar Group.  During the lengthy session, David Rodriguez outlined the benefits and disadvantages of Santander not falling within the Sugar Act.

 

David Rodriguez, Santander

“We definitely are not under the Sugar Act even though the Ministry of Agriculture has already given us a license for operating a mill in Belize.  We have a license and a permit from the Department of Agriculture to grind and operate a sugar mill in Belize.  The legal figure we are operating currently was formerly known as an EPZ, export processing zone, right now.  It changed a couple of years ago to the DPA, designated processing area.  We are operating on that and basically that’s a fiscal incentive program that the country offers.  It’s the one that we made operate in Belize.  With that legal status that we have or according to the way that we are operating here, since we are not under the umbrella of the Sugar Act, we don’t have access to some of the preferential markets that Belize as a country has access.  We don’t have access to the TRQs from the United States, that it’s a quota for a country and not for a single company.  So we don’t have access to that preferential market and as I mentioned before, we don’t have access to sell sugar to the local market.”