November 15, 2003	Saturday	Ramazan 19, 1424

KARACHI, Nov 14: About a dozen sugar mills out of 28 operational mills in Sindh are reported to have fired their boilers on Friday, signalling the commencement of sugarcane crushing in next 10 to 12 days.

“More sugar mills are also starting to heat up their boilers in next few days to begin sugarcane crushing just after Eidul Fitr,” Subhago Jatoi, agricultural secretary in the Sindh government, told Dawn on Friday.

He said the boiler took about 10 days to heat up to the level of sugar making process, and before the end of this month all mills in the province were expected to begin crushing in full pace.

“Matiari Sugar Mills is likely to begin sugarcane crushing in next few days,” the secretary added.

Sources at the Trading Corporation of Pakistan said that till Saturday, the sugar mills had bought about 30 bidding forms to respond to the government’s tender of 100,000 tons sugar purchase from the millers.

“The bids will be opened on Saturday noon and we expect all sugar mills having sizable stocks will participate,” a well-placed source at the TCP said.

The TCP floated a tender for purchase of 100,000 tons of sugar from the millers’ stock late last week. The tender was earlier scheduled to be opened on Wednesday (Nov 12), which was put off till Friday (Nov 14) because the millers refused to participate. Now the millers have been persuaded to participate in the bidding and the growers in Sindh have also agreed to sell sugarcane at Rs41 a maund.

The sources said the government had worked out a system to counter any move of cartel formation by the sugar millers, and it had been decided to fix a certain price ceiling beyond which even the lowest bid would not be accepted.

An interesting aspect of millers-farmers feud is the fact that both the sides have political heavyweights. The millers in Punjab include Chowdhry Shujaat, leftover family members of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif and a few ministers, MNAs and MPAs.

Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali has been the most vocal supporter of the growers who gave a policy statement sometimes back that there was no need of more land reforms in the country.

Observers say that corporatization of farming was proposed with an idea that ceiling on land holding may be abolished once for all in this garb.

Sugarcane crushing begins this season after a lot of acrimony and tension between the farmers, particularly in Sindh. The growers demanded payment of over Rs2 billion default money from the millers before they sell their produce this season. The millers refused to pay Rs43 per maund for sugarcane on the plea that it showed a difference of Rs3 per maund in prices prevailing in Punjab and it cost them heavily.

Market watchers say the millers bought sugarcane at Rs65 and Rs70 a maund in Sindh a few years ago when sugar prices in the open market skyrocketed and assured a handsome return.

The Sindh government is taking adequate measures to ensure that the millers pay back arrears of about Rs1 billion to the growers before the end of December and a little over Rs1 billion on account of last year’s premium quality by the end of January 2004.

The TCP will start paying 85 per cent of agreed price to the millers and the Sindh government would monitor payment of arrears to the growers. The Sugarcane Factory Act 1950 provides enough punitive measures against the millers who flout rules.

In their meeting with the federal ministers for commerce, finance and industry in Islamabad on Tuesday the millers had complained that the Sindh government intended to arrest them under the MPO. A Sindh government official attending the meeting had said that there was no such plan to arrest the millers under the MPO. “But definitely, the government would take action under Sugarcane Factory Act 1950,” he had then warned.