Barbados 'not waiting on EU' for sugar help - by Trevor Yearwood
WHETHER OR NOT the European Union (EU) comes up with financing, Barbados will push ahead with a plan for transforming the sugar industry. Minister of Agriculture and Rural development, Senator Erskine Griffith, made this comment Tuesday during a media conference at Island Inn Hotel. He said Europe, which for many years had been a major buyer of Barbados bulk sugar, was losing its significance to the island's economy. Griffith spoke against the backdropof the European Union's (EU) plans for a gradual reduction in preferential rates for bulk sugar shipped by the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) group of nations. In the interim, the EU has allocated about $96.6 million to the group for 2006 for coping with the coming loss – provided the countries meet a deadline for submission of plans for a viable sugar industry – or what Griffith calls "an adaptation strategy document".
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