This is the final in a five-part series looking at life in communities where sugar was once king, but in which the government-owned factories are about to change hands.

Entire communities which depend on the Long Pond Sugar factory in Trelawny for their survival are on the brink of economic death.

The residents are angry, not only because hundreds of them have been out of work since the last cane crop in August, but because they believe mismanagement of the government-owned factory over the years is to be blamed for their troubles.

Yet others are fuming that after working in sugar, many for more than 40 years, they are left with nothing but medical bills from illnesses they claim are a direct result of the back-breaking task of cutting cane in the hot sun.

Miles and miles of cane fields surround the factory in this section of the parish where majority of the land is utilised for sugar cane farming.

In sugar’s heyday the miles of cane fields were a welcoming sight as hundreds of residents fed, clothed and sheltered their families from the living they eked out of the industry.

Today, they say, do not be fooled by the massive expanse of cane fields as they are over-run with grass from a failure to properly maintain the estates to ensure higher yields.

One resident of Jackson Town, who identified himself only as B Smith, lays the blame squarely at the feet of Long Pond’s managers who, he said, have failed to ensure that the factory produced at its fullest capacity.

“Just look at the cane fields, is more grass than cane in it,” said Smith, who has worked inside the factory for more than 25 years.

“Maybe when investors fly over the cane fields and see say is pure grass them would have to buy them no bother want to buy it,” he quipped in reference to the failed attempt by the Government to divest the factory by the December 31 deadline.

Agriculture Minister Christopher Tufton recently admitted to the Sunday Observer that poor and inconsistent management along with weak political leadership were among the factors that contributed to the fallout in sugar, which spreads across at least 26 constituencies.

Tufton said Long Pond produced only 6,000 tonnes of sugar last year, although it has the capacity to produce 20,000 tonnes.

Smith said with no proper supervision in place, sometimes the edges of the cane fields are weeded, but the grass is left hidden in the middle and this is usually only discovered during harvesting when the tonnage is much less than anticipated.

He said this large quantity of grass among the cane prevents the crop from thriving as the weeds consume the fertiliser and take away nutrients from the cane.

“If a new company takes over the factory they would have to cut down all of this and plough up the ground and start from scratch,” he said, adding that those workers who will be hired on contract when the factory begins operation – which is anybody’s guess – will end up doing much more work than they are paid for as they will have to weed the grass to get at the cane.

In years gone by workers would be paid extra if they have to weed grass from the cane fields during harvesting, but this year the men have already been informed that they will only be paid for each tonne of cane cut.

“Now the workers dem going to go out there and have to work the whole day just to cut a tonne because more grass in the fields than cane,” he said.

Several other residents told the Sunday Observer that “desperation to find work” will make them settle for anything as long as they can get enough money to buy food.

Raphael Clarke, who said he has worked in sugar for more than 30 years, also blamed poor maintenance of the factory’s equipment and the cane for the unprofitability of the factory.

“You look and see miles and miles of cane but when you check it out is acreages of grass,” said Clarke, who lives in Jackson Town.

He doubts the factory will be up and running by this March, as he says the factory is in a dilapidated state and repairs are far from complete since they started so late after the last season.

Whether or not he is re-employed on contract at the start of the cane season, Clarke says he wants to see the factory up and running soon in order to stave off the doom which has already began spreading like a thick smoke over the community.

Clarke said last season’s crop was one of the worst in history with many taking home far less than they had in previous years.

With less take-home pay they had no savings to tide them over in these rough months.

“Three months never pass down here and we nuh work a factory,” he lamented. “How we going to get money to get by,”‘ he asked despondently.

George Brown has not worked at the factory now for more than 20 years but he is asking the same question, since he relies on sugar workers’ incomes to keep his Clarks Town shoemaking business open.

“Who use to give you one little shoes fi fix can’t afford it again, and so me nuh know when last me get work,” he said. For now he is surviving, barely, by doing odd jobs.

Ethlyn Nelson said she may have been officially employed in sugar from 1952 to 2004, but she has worked in the fields since she was 12 years old alongside her parents who were also cane cutters.

During crop time she wielded her machete like her male counterparts, cutting tonnes of cane and during off peak seasons she used her hoe to dig guinea grass from the cane roots.

The job helped her to send her children to school. It also fed, clothed and sheltered her throughout the years.

However, she also blamed the job for the two strokes she suffered, which have left her languishing in her squished living quarters in Clarks Town.

“When you work in the hot sun it give you stroke out there in the field because the sun cause you blood pressure fi rise,” she said.

Now, as she struggles to maintain her blood pressure, Nelson said she cannot survive on the $4,000 pension she receives each fortnight but still considers herself more fortunate than most of her peers who do not even get $2,000.

“If I was to be born again I would never ever go back into sugar,” she said.

Despite these regrets, Nelson knows the importance of the factory to her community and so she hopes that the season will begin soon so her friend, 63 year old Adassa Wilson, can have hope of getting back a job.

Wilson said she also got a stroke while working in the fields but said she has no other source of income. Her husband and son also worked in the cane fields and they all have been living off the 14 weeks’ notice pay given in December. But this, too, is drying up fast.

An increase in crime in the deep rural communities has been blamed squarely on the fallout from sugar.

Francis Green, who lives in Clarks Town, said it is the worst he has ever seen it, and he should know, having had his meal stolen from a fire recently.

“Me cook me food and just taste it and say me a go drink a rum first before me eat… when me come back, is only the wood fire me see because all the pot dem gone with,” he told the Sunday Observer.

Green, like many of the residents, worked in sugar at some point but said he left it because “dem pay too cheap”.

He opted to benefit indirectly by selling brooms in the town. But even that has been affected due to the massive job loss. Not only are persons buying fewer brooms but the competition has become quite fierce as more of the 832 persons who lost their jobs at the factory seek other ways of making a living.

“First time me woulda sell whole heap a broom, but me barely can sell any now because everybody a sell broom, all some who can’t even meck it good,” he said.

At 82 years old, Guy Campbell, a resident of neighbouring Jackson Town, said he is glad he got out of sugar and went to work in bauxite many years ago, otherwise he would not have been able to help some of his neighbours who lost their jobs.

“Things can’t get any worse down here,” he said. “From me born is the first me ever see it like this.”

His wife, Maud, said everywhere people are begging to feed their children. “They come and say ‘grandma, me a beg yu one $20 or a hand a banana or a breadfruit’ because they are hungry and have nothing,” she said.

She, however, cannot help all the time because she assists her grandchildren with lunch money for school now that her son, their father, is among the casualties of sugar.

He has not worked since last year and can no longer afford to send the children to school regularly.

“The other day he left here go way a Bamboo in St Ann for a day work just fi get something fi do,” she said

Maud said she never worked in sugar as she had to stay home and take care of her 10 children. However, she has no regrets.

“Now my children give me more pension than me could ever get from sugar,” she said.