KARACHI, June 27: The government has allowed both commercial importers and sugar mills to import raw sugar having more or less than 600ICUMSA, which means that sugar with above this level would require further processing before selling out to end-consumers. While sugar with less than 600ICUMSA is fit for human consumption and does not need further processing.

This issue came up under discussion at a meeting held by Pakistan Commodity Importers Association Chairman Raees Ashraf Tarmohammad. It was clarified that last week’s government decision on import of essential commodities did allow commercial importers as well as sugar mills to import any quality of raw sugar.

Tarmohammad told Dawn that there had been a lot of confusion about the quality of sugar allowed by the government to be imported. However, after holding a meeting on Monday, it was clarified that sugar quality with less than 600ICUMSA could also be imported by both commercial importers and sugar mills.

He said that sugar with less than 600ICUMSA was sold as brown sugar in Europe and was more in demand there than white crystal sugar, which is processed with chemicals such as sulphur and caustic.

He further said that the allowing of sugar import with less than 600ICUMSA would give a great relief to the beverage and confectionary industry, which uses sugar in bulk, and could also help them control their rising production costs.

Above all, he said that our rural population mostly consumed brown sugar made out of ‘gur’ and this in a way would help to replace it with the imported sugar as it also had brown colour and fit for human consumption.

The country, he said, would need around 1.2 million tons of sugar before November when new crushing season starts. With the import of brown sugar the price of sugar in the open market would also come down, he said.

Referring to import of livestock and other essential goods, he said that the government had nominated five companies of world repute to conduct pre-shipment lab tests of such commodities.