Ministry of Industries and Production has convened a meeting of Sugar Advisory Board (SAB) on Thursday (today) to discuss approval of further export of 0.5 million tons of sugar on the request of Pakistan Sugar Mills Association (PSMA). To be presided over by the Secretary Industries and Production, Khizer Hayat Gondal, the meeting will be attended by the representatives of Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of National Food Security, State Bank of Pakistan, Federal Board of Revenue (FBR), Secretary Food KPK, Secretary Food Punjab, Secretary Industries, Sindh and Secretary Industries Balochistan. Besides, Cane Commissioner of Punjab, Sindh and KPK and President Kissan Board Lahore will also attend the meeting.
The meeting has been convened after a massive advertisement campaign by the sugar industry. Well-informed sources told Business Recorder that Punjab has produced 3.4 million tons of sugar, followed by Sindh about 1.8 million and KPK 0.388 million. However, it is expected that Punjab will have 3.8 million tons of sugar at the end of crushing season, followed by Sindh 1.9 million and KPK 0.425 million tons. "SAB will firm up figures of expected surplus quantity of sugar and recommend to the Commerce Ministry to send a summary to the ECC for further export of surplus sugar," said an on official on condition of anonymity. However, the government will get a guarantee from the sugar industry that in case of increase in price of over three per cent, export permission will be annulled.
Sugar industry recently wrote a letter to the Commerce Secretary, Azmat Ali Ranjha seeking permission to export additional quantity of 0.5 million tons of sugar without any rebate to avert default in payments to growers and dispose off surplus commodity at attractive prices in the international market.
Copies of that letter have been sent to Minister for Finance Minister, Senator Ishaq Dar, who is the Chairman of the Economic Co-ordination Committee (ECC) of the Cabinet, which takes sugar export decisions in consultation with other ECC members including Minister for Commerce, Engineer Khurram Dastgir Khan, Secretary Finance, Tariq Bajwa, Secretary Ministry of Industries and Production, Khizer Hayat Gondal and Secretary Ministry of National Food Security and Research (MNFSR), Abid Javed.
According to the letter, sugar industry argued that as per crop report presented by the Ministry of National Food Security and Research during the previous meeting of Sugar Advisory Board held on December 19, 2016, sugarcane production was forecast to be in excess of 71 million tons as area under cultivation increased due to timely payments made to sugarcane growers. Sugarcane yield has also shown an improvement compared to preceding years, resultantly, the sugar industry foresees a record sugarcane production during the current crushing season.
The industry has also stated that mills' utilisation of sugarcane is around 80 per cent which means 56.8 million tons of sugar will be crushed to produce sugar. The average sucrose recovery on all Pakistan basis is about 10 per cent hence sugar industry safely assumes a total production of about 5.68 million tons of sugar as against previous conservative estimates based on which permission to export 0.225 million tons was granted.
When contacted Minister for Commerce, Khurram Dastgir said the government will review the entire scenario including price numbers and export numbers and international trends very soon as the earlier permission of 0.225 million tons export of sugar will expire on March 31, 2017. "It's our wish that industry should export sugar but not at the cost of domestic consumers," Dastgir added.
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