Catfish exporters suffering as Guyana fails to meet US Food standards

Heeralall Sukdeo, owner of Sukdeo and Sons Fishing Enterprise, says that local companies have suffered significant losses since they can no longer export catfish to the United States of America and he predicts even more severe ramifications if measures are not put in place to address the ban.

The United Stated Department of Agriculture (USDA) has implemented a ban on catfish imports from Guyana and other countries. The exporters from the various countries are required by the US Food and Safety Inspection Services (FSIS) to provide documentation to verify that their respective country’s inspection system is equivalent to the US standards, or that the degree of its public health system is equivalent to the USA’s.

However, while the local authorities have attempted to comply with the request, the country has fallen short of the US standards in three areas: the presence of inspectors; insufficient documentation detailing verification of each step in the sanitation and Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP); and insufficient documentation specifying how the industry manages adulterated (tainted) catfish products.

Sukdeo, of Annandale, East Coast Demerara, lamented that the ban is putting severe pressure on the exporters who focus heavily on sending their raw and smoked catfish to the United States.

According to Sukdeo, who has been in the catfish-exporting business since 1985, he has never witnessed a ban on the exportation of the fish and says that it is currently creating havoc in the industry.

“Right now the company close and can’t work since the ban. Is about three months or so that we haven’t been able to ship. We Guyanese love catfish, but the Caribbean Indians and Africans dem love dem catfish,” Sukdeo said, while indicating that more than 40% of his exports went to the US market.

In addition to the American market, Sukdeo stated that he also taps into the Canadian, Barbadian, Surinamese and Venezuelan markets, but they cannot substitute for the loss of the US market.

“There is not enough space in the Guyanese market to use the amount of catfish and smoke fish in the country. No other country in any other part of the world got catfish like this country. Me born in fishing and exporting, and I never see any catfish like what we got,” Sukdeo