SUGARCANE farming brothers Krishna and Davend Deo are lamenting the end of their family’s long and proud history in the industry, a legacy that ends the day they decide to retire from the sugar business.

The duo said they would be the last from their family to engage in cane cultivation.

The brothers said the issues they faced over the past 10 years had been so bad that cane growing was no longer a business they wanted to be involved in.

Davend, 49, said as if the increasing costs in preparation and harvesting were not bad enough, they now had to deal with a hike in Crown land rent — from $770 to $1200 per annum.

“In 2015 we were using labourers but now we only hire labourers for hilly areas where the mechanical harvest cannot operate,” he said.

“The mechanical harvesters cost $28 per tonne, labourers charge $24 per tonne, we spend more than $1000 on fertiliser and $500 on other chemicals.

“In terms of land preparation, we pay $70 for every acre that a tractor clears or ploughs and $53 for every tonne of seedling for an acre of land.

“We hire five labourers to help in planting and they each get $20 a day not including meals.

“We use four bags of Blend A fertiliser per acre on our 10 acre farm, each bag costs $31.50 and in total that comes to about $350. We spend about $2790 on planting alone.”

“Our forefathers were sugar ane growers,” said Davend.

“We are the last generation of canefarmers in our family. Our children don’t want to farm because there is no profit in it.

“The cost of living is too high and we can’t depend on sugarcane farming anymore.”‘