Colombia Sugar Mill, A Giant That Is Slow To Wake Up

Colombia Sugar Mill, A Giant That Is Slow To Wake Up / 14ymedio, Luz Escobar

14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 4 February 2017 — Colombia's sugar mill
whistle sounded again at the end of January, like a giant awakened from
a seven-year-long lethargy. The residents in the area breathed a sign of
relief: the driving force behind the local economy seems to be the sugar
mill, but technical and organizational problems have delayed its start.

The directors of the colossus announced three weeks ago that everything
was ready for the industry to join the current harvest. The local press
announced the start for 25 January, but the lack of some parts and other
setbacks have prevented meeting that target. The peasants of the
surrounding area fear that their mill will be shut down again, plunging
the town into somnolence.

The sugar industry defined almost three centuries in our national life,
and was the island's main economic base, determining our language, our
customs and even our identity, strongly tied to the sugar plantation and
the mill. But what looked like a rising sector suffered severe reversals
in the last two decades.

In the 1990s, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the country was
faced with the reality of an inefficient agroindustry, with a great
technological obsolescence and an international market where the
national product was worth less and less.

The cuts reached as far as the Colombia sugar mill, which because of its
importance in production many believed would never turn off its
boilers. Rogelio, 40-years-old and a neighbor of the mill, recalls how
in the past, as late afternoon fell, a parade of "ragged men with
machetes in their hands, tired and covered with ashes from the cane
burning, passed in front of my house."

He states that "every day at six-thirty in the afternoon the bagasse
(the cane waste) filling the air forces us to close doors and windows"
and that it was always "accompanied by the mill whistle" that could be
heard throughout the town.

But all that is ancient history. Sugar production began to slide down
the slope failure. In June last year, Noel Casañas Lugo, vice president
of the Azcuba Sugar Group, acknowledged that the production of the last
harvest only reached 80% of the predicted plan and remained below
the 1.6 million tonnes of sugar achieved in 2015.

Colombia is one of the four main urban centers of the province of Las
Tunas and the mill began to operate in 1916. The large wooden houses
built on stilts hark back to that time, as do the memories that the
families pass on by word of mouth about the power of a machinery that
did not stop grinding up the cane in every harvest.

The knowledge acquired in long hours of labor was transferred between
generations without the involvement of any schools and the whole town
revolved around the mill. It beat to the rhythm of the chimney and
seemed to languish between the harvests.

The Las Tunas mill was selected for its productive results as a "pilot
model" to integrate into the Business Improvement plan at the end of the
last century. But even that did not save it from an abrupt closure at
the beginning of this millennium. Its workers, then, were given the most
difficult task, one for which they were the least prepared: to stop
producing sugar.

The peasants and workers tried to mitigate the situation by sowing
potatoes and tobacco where before there had been cane, but the majority
were unemployed. The town paused. There were neither rows of ash-covered
workers nor bagasse floating in the air … and much less economic prosperity.

In 2011, the Ministry of Sugar was weakened and the new Azcuba Sugar
Group was created, subordinated to the State Council. But the new
institution has not been able to revitalize the sector, which is also
affected by low wages, technical difficulties and the exodus of people
from the countryside to urban centers.

In the last month qualified technicians have come from other provinces
to readjust the framework of the industrial complex. Every time an
anxious neighbor asks about the date when work will be resumed, the
response is spare and imprecise: "next week."

To meet its production forecasts, the province of Las Tunas depends on
Colombia joining in the harvest, along with the Antonio Guiteras mill,
which is not experiencing its best moment, and Majibacoa, which has
managed to maintain a stable crop, according to a recent report from the
local press.

The 17,462 tonnes of sugar called for in the plan is a challenge for an
industry that has suffered such a long-term stoppage, along with
vandalism of the technology and also the loss of skilled workers.
Administrators have mobilized veteran workers and ensure that "all key
posts of the sugar mill are covered," according to statements to the
press by Elido Suarez Nunez, head of industrial maintenance.

The town seems to be living in a carnival. Like in one of those popular
festivals where it is not known if at the end of the night a colorful
and friendly giant will appear surrounded by lights and sounds, or
instead there will be a return to darkness and boredom.

Source: Colombia Sugar Mill, A Giant That Is Slow To Wake Up / 14ymedio,
Luz Escobar – Translating Cuba -
https://translatingcuba.com/colombia-sugar-mill-a-giant-that-is-slow-to-wake-up-14ymedio-luz-escobar/