Indonesia plans to import 240,000 tonnes of raw sugar this year to make up for a white sugar shortage before the domestic milling season in May, the agriculture minister said on Tuesday. "We need additional white sugar supply in 2012 for one month worth of consumption," said Suswono. "We will not import white sugar, but raw sugar as we still have idle capacity locally at sugar mills."
Indonesia, Southeast Asia's top sugar consumer, said earlier this month that it will not import any white sugar this year because it has enough stocks to see it through until its milling season. Indonesia imported 118,129 tonnes of white sugar last year, from total permits for 450,000 tonnes.
"The question is that whether these imports are beyond the import quotas which are being discussed for this year? It's quite confusing because they have said they are not going to import any whites. But now they are chasing raw sugar so that they can make whites," said a physical sugar dealer in Singapore, who sells sugar to Indonesia.
The country imports 60 percent of its sugar from Thailand, 20 percent from Brazil and 10 percent from Australia, the Indonesian Sugar Association (AGI) says. Indonesia was once the world's second-largest sugar exporter in the 1930s. But ageing sugar mills, a vast network of smallholders and an influx of cheaper imported sugar put pressure on local production. Sugarcane farmers protested in December against plans to import sugar this year. The ministry will propose a white sugar farm gate price of 8,750 rupiah a kg, up from 7,000 rupiah per kg last year, Suswono said.
Comments
Comments are closed for this article.