The request of food and beverages manufacturers for President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to allow them to directly import sugar for their needs is a recipe for economic disaster in the sugar industry, a labor leader said Wednesday, March 29.
Wennie Sancho, Save the Sugar in Industry Movement (SAVE-SIM) convenor, said in a press release that “the call of these industrial users is motivated by their excessive corporate greed for profit at the expense of the stakeholders of the sugar industry, particularly the small producers”.
“Let us not allow the insatiable greed by companies owned and controlled by foreigners. Direct importation of sugar is a form of economic sabotage,” he said.
SAVE-SIM vehemently opposes and condemns this scheme to protect and save the sugar industry. The approval of this request would serve as the final nail that would seal the coffin of a dead sugar industry, Sancho said.
This crucial issue involves the economic welfare of millions of workers and their families in the sugar industry, he said.
“We cannot sit and wait for the blow to fall, it could be the last,” Sancho added.*