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WEEKLY
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| Sugarcane crushing begins next week |
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Wednesday, November 04, 2009
ISLAMABAD: Pakistani sugar mills will start crushing cane from the new crop by next week, a top industry official said on Tuesday, but the country will still need imports to meet domestic needs.
Pakistan is expecting 3.5 million tons of refined sugar from the 2009/10 crop as against annual domestic requirements of 4-4.2 million tons.
All mills in Sindh will be crushing by the middle of the month, said Abdul Wajid, chairman of the Sindh chapter of the private Pakistan Sugar Mills Association, which handles the bulk of the commodity.
“Two or three mills have already lit their boilers and the rest will be following suit and crushing will start by November 12 or so,” Wajid told Reuters.
Of a total 82 mills, 32 are in Sindh and 44 are in Punjab, which will start crushing in the last week of the month or in the first week of December, industry officials said. Six mills are in the North West Frontier Province.
Wajid expected Sindh to produce up to 800,000 tons of refined sugar, down from an average 1.2 million tons a year, mainly because of low yield and a cut in the area under sugar.
With no or very little carry-over stocks, millers have proposed that the government imports raw sugar for meeting domestic needs and to replenish buffer stocks.
“We have told the government to import 700,000 to 800,000 tons of raw sugar, otherwise they will be in trouble again,” he said.
Pakistan produced 3.2 million tons of refined sugar from the previous crop, according to estimates from millers, and the country this year imported 225,000 tons of refined sugar to meet demand and keep prices in check after the government ignored millers’ advise to import raw sugar.
For the new season, the government has already announced plans to import 300,000 tons of raw sugar, although food ministry officials said last month the plan was to import up to one million tons in coming months.
Wajid said raw sugar had to come within weeks so it could be processed along with the domestic crop this crushing season, which usually lasts until the first week of March.
Despite the import of refined sugar this year, Pakistanis have faced shortages since last month.
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ISSN 1563-9479 
