HYDERABAD: The Sindh government has yet to notify the indicative price for sugarcane and fix crushing date despite the fact that the 1950 Act calls for beginning of crushing season in October.

Meanwhile, influential millers are aiming for additional subsidy from the Sindh government besides the one given by the federal government on sugar exports. Such subsidy is to come from public purse.

The Pakistan Sugar Mills Association (PSMA) said that if it failed to get subsidy, it won’t pay more than Rs1,250 per 40kg to growers and delay crushing.

Meanwhile, growers are agitating to safeguard their interests and seek a price of Rs200 per 40kg. On the other hand, millers demand for an increase in rebate and permission to export 1.5m tonnes sugar in one go rather than exporting 500,000 tonnes tranches in phases.

Anticipating surplus sugar due to a bumper crop this year, PSMA Sindh Zone Chairman, Asim Ghani says the government must allow open export in 2017-18 so that international markets can be capitalised.

He expects the Sindh government to pitch in the subsidy like it did previously.

A meeting of Sugar Advisory Board was held in Islamabad on Oct 27 where PSMA pressed for exporting another 1m tonnes of sugar with Rs18-Rs19 per kg instead of Rs10.70 per kg subsidy besides 500,000 tonnes, allowed in September by Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) with a rebate of Rs10.70/1kg. Cost of subsidy is to be shared on 50-50 per cent basis by the provincial and federal governments.

“In the Oct 27 meeting, millers offered to pay Rs140/40kg in 2017-18,” says a government official.

He added that reports of Sindh agriculture department show sugarcane acreage has increased by another 20,000 acres in the province.

Sugarcane growers are protesting delay in commencement of crushing season, saying they would have to supply more water to save the crop at the cost of wheat sowing.

Protests are being held by farmers’ bodies like Sindh Abadgar Ittehad and Sindh Agriculture Research Council.

The Sindh government, on behalf of millers, had paid around Rs4 billion subsidy in 2014-15 season while payment of Rs10 differential amount is pending subject to disposal of millers’ case against sugarcane cost in apex court.

Sindh Abadgar Board (SAB) vice president Mahmood Nawaz Shah says that to handle the present situation, the government must ensure some credit line to growers along with some concessions to ensure their cost of keeping stocks.

He says that if millers want regulation of sugar, they could take it up with government. “Existing law governs sugarcane crushing and not sugar. Our crop of 2017-18 has been in field for 13 to 14 months and growers have already invested on crop which will be harvested in 2018-19 season,” he added.

Published in Dawn, October 31st, 2017