Comments
Sugar production in the first six months of the current season ending September dropped seven per cent to 21.5 million tonnes (mt) against 23.1 mt in the same period a year ago. Though crushing has entered the last phase, about 330 mills are still functionalagainst 231 last year.
The Indian Sugar Mills Association expects that about two million tonnes of sugar would be produced in the remaining part of the current crushing season.
Total cane arrears are estimated at ₹15,000 crore, with mills in Uttar Pradesh having to clear about ₹10,500 crore and Karnataka mills ₹3,300 crore to growers.
Output break-up Barring Karnataka, where production has increased, key States such as Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh have witnessed a lower output than last year.
Production in Maharashtra is currently 9 per cent lower at 7.01 mt even as 85 mills are still crushing caneagainst 42 last year.
In Uttar Pradesh, the output is 13 per cent lower at 5.8 mt despite higher recovery of 9.21 per cent.
Alternate industry Poor cane yields and higher diversion to the alternate sweetener manufacturing industry has impacted output this year.
Karnataka has so far produced 12 per cent more sugar at 3.75 mt, against 3.36 mt last year.
However, in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, production has been lower at 9.40 lakh tonnes and 9.50 lakh tonnes, respectively.
Comments
COMMENT NOW
Comments
Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.
We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.