(Jamaica Gleaner) Premium Farms and Trading Limited, which had failed to pay Guyanese company Pure Harvest Incorporated US$90, 170 for two shipments of rice in December 2019, has been ordered by the Supreme Court to pay the outstanding sum.
Justice Stephanie Jackson-Haisley in handing down her decision last month found that the defendant, Premium Farms, had breached the terms of the contract in failing to make payments in accordance with the invoices.
Premium Farms, of which developer and businessman Richard Lake is managing director, did not deny receiving the shipments of rice, neither did it deny owing the money.
It instead alleged that there was an agreement for the defendant to be the exclusive distributor of the claimant’s rice, but the claimant breached the exclusivity term, resulting in the defendant’s inability to collect its receivables from customers.
“Further and/or alternatively that any sums due were based on the agreement and understanding that payments were wholly contingent on the successful completion of other sales contracts,” the defendant alleged.
Tamesh Jagmohan, managing director of Pure Harvest said in 2019 when the company was looking to expand its market he journeyed to Jamaica to meet Lake and Omar Newell, who was the then general manager of Premium Farms.
The meeting was fruitful and by March 2019, his company began sending rice to the defendant for sale in the Jamaican market. The defendant paid for the first few shipments but failed to pay for the last two.
Attorney-at-law Odeanie Kerr, instructed by Alexander Williams & Co, represented the claimant and argued that the terms of payment under the contract were governed by the written contract agreed between the parties and at the time Newell was authorised to enter into contracts on behalf of the defendant.
Kerr refuted the defendant’s allegation of exclusivity and said no cogent evidence had been provided by the defendant to support exclusive dealings. Kerr emphasised that on one hand the defendant was saying that the reason for not settling the debt was that the customers complained about the poor quality of the rice, and on the other hand it was saying that Newell had lured away key customers to offer them the same rice.
He asked the court to find that there were no issues with the rice and the defendant was entitled to pay the outstanding sums agreed in the contract.
Attorneys-at-law Melissa McLeod and Shayanne Hylton represented the defendant and argued that the issues to be considered were what was the agreement, whether the claimant breached the agreement and whether the breach led to the defendant’s repudiation of same.
In reviewing the evidence, the judge said “It was obvious that it was Mr Newell who had direct involvement with Pure Harvest and how its sale of rice was treated with, a position which Mr Lake did not voice any opposition to at the time.
Even when asked about the debt, Mr Lake seemed to be changing the evidence in his witness statement to say that he didn’t consider his company to be in debt,” the judge said.
According to the Judge it became obvious to her that the change in how Lake and Premium Farms dealt with the claimant was heavily influenced by Newell’s sudden departure from Premium Farms around February 2020 and the fallout with Newell, who was no longer the defendant’s managing director.
Newell moved on to form a company that was competing with the defendant and was operating in a manner that was affecting the sales of the defendant, the judge said.
“In any event, when I compare the evidence given by Mr Jagmohan with that of Mr Lake, I found Mr Jagmohan to be more consistent and credible,” the judge held.
On a balance of probabilities, the judge found the claimant’s case to be more consistent with the truth than that of the defendant’s.
The judge said she did not accept that there was an agreement for exclusivity nor was there any agreement that the payment of invoices was contingent on sales.
The defendant having failed to make payment in accordance with the invoices dated December 11, 2019 and December 20, 2019 renders the defendant in breach of the contract, the judge ruled.
Judgment in the sum of US$ 90, 170 was awarded to the claimant. The defendant was ordered to pay the claimant’s legal costs.