LAHORE: The increase in sugarcane price at Rs180 per 40kg by the Punjab government, with the purchasing difference of Rs22 per mound, has also lifted the provincial industry’s cost by Rs22.5 billion
Due to heavy cost, the Sindh millers are also dumping their crop in Punjab as the Sindh’s mills have dumped 100,000 tons of sugar here.
Punjab supplies 225,000 metric tonne out of the total consumption in the country of 390,000 metric tonnes of sugar.
The sugar industry representatives, in a meeting with the Punjab Cabinet Committee, has made it clear that mills are unable to pay the farmers further due to additional cost of Rs22.5 billion.
They said that Sindh government has announced to compensate the millers by paying Rs12 per 40kg to the growers despite the fact that sugarcane rate was finally fixed at Rs172 per 40kg in Sindh as compared to the support price of Rs180 per 40kg in Punjab.
PSMA Punjab chairman Javed Kayani said, “We are already not in a position to retrieve cost of sugarcane to make payments to growers at a notified price of Rs180 per 40kg. With the onslaught and flux of sugar from Sindh at lower cost of production it is impossible to sell bulging stock in local and international market.”
After comparison with Sindh, the calculation shows the rate of sugarcane in Punjab should stand at Rs158 per 40 kg.
Hence, the Punjab government, in line with the Sindh authorities, should announce the additional payment of Rs22 per kg, besides formulating a policy to issue interest-free loans to sugar mills which are already facing forced closure.
