The government of Barbados is planning a $102 million (USD) project to diversify the sugar industry in the country with bagasse, ethanol, special sugars and molasses, Senator Darcy Boyce announced yesterday.

The project initially cost approximately $200 million, but has been cut down to a size that makes it viable with the land currently existing for sugar production.

“We recognize that bagasse from sugar cane will not, by itself, be able to give us the kind of return that we want,” he said. “We have actually commissioned workers to look at the economics of growing other biomass, river tamarind and other things we now grow in Barbados, but we actually have to get some hard data.”

Boyce said that the Barbadian sugar cane industry needed to increase its productivity to raise the number of tonnes of cane per acre, and that it did not make sense to continue “pouring” money into the industry without improving its technology.

“If we do not improve the technology we will build up for a while and then we will have to come back in 10 years’ time and have to do it all over again.”

–Barbados Information Service