ISLAMABAD, May 6: The Pakistan Sugar Mills Association (PSMA) has estimated around 900,000 tons of surplus sugar currently lying in the country and has proposed that at least 500,000 tons should be exported.

It has convened a meeting on Wednesday to firm up its production figures and then present a case to the government to open up sugar export because stocks were lying open under the sky due to unmanageable position.

Ashraf Tabani, former PSMA chairman and K. Ali Qazilbash PSMA secretary general told Dawn here on Tuesday that even if the government wanted to ensure a buffer stock of 400,000 tons, it should allow export of 491,000 tons of sugar by the industry.

According to their estimates sugarcane production stood at 53 million tons which was around 4 million tons higher than last year’s. Mr. Tabani said that sugar production amounted to 3.678 million tons this year against last year’s 3.276 million tons.

He said that if carry over stock of 637,149 tons was taken into account, total sugar availability comes to 4.315 million tons. He said that Pakistan’s total consumption was around 3.324 million tons at the rate of 277,000 tons per month.

As such, total surplus after local consumption would be 991,000 tons. Of this, the Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) was expected to export 100,000 ton but only 12,500 tons had so far been exported.

He said that even if this 100,000 is not taken into account, around 891,000 tons of sugar would still be available with the sugar mills after meeting local demand.

Mr Qazilbash confirmed that the government had stopped export of sugar to Afghanistan on which it was providing a rebate.

They said that local retail price of sugar recorded officially by the government was Rs19.83 per kg which was very near to the total production cost which meant that a severe crisis has hit the industry.