KASUR: Low prices of sugarcane and involvement of middleman have forced farmers to make jaggery (gur) instead of selling the yield to sugar mills.

Now, the abundant supply of gur to the market has reduced its prices in the recent days.

Farmer Muhammad Din explains the arithmetic of the sugarcane.

He says the average produce of sugarcane per acre is 600 maunds (40 kilogrammes make one maund). According to the official price of Rs180 per 40 kg, a farmer should get Rs108,000 from one acre but the mill owners are paying Rs72,000 per acre under the price of Rs120 per maund.

One maund gur is produced from 10 maunds of sugarcane. Given the price of gurr at the local market (Rs1,200) per maund, a farmer would get Rs72,000 per acre from the gur production.

Another farmer Muhammad Jamil said they preferred to making ‘gur’ to get cash for their day-to-day needs but a huge influx of ‘gurr’ had disturbed its prices leaving farmers again in hot waters.

Also, the farmers, who have sold their yield to the Pattoki Sugar Mills, protested against the mills administration for giving them low prices and that too through the middleman.Pakistan Kissan Board Information Secretary Muhammad Ramzan said that in the light of the orders of the Supreme Court, the mill owners were bound to buy sugarcane on official rate that is Rs180 per 40kg.

He added that the mill owners were flouting the court orders while the district administration was silent. He demanded that farmers be paid in accordance with official rates and that the mills not be closed on April 15 as sugarcane crop was still standing over hundreds of acres.

Published in Dawn, March 11th, 2018