Sugar production lags 11% over past year, cane arrears reach Rs 14,000 crore

NEW DELHI: As the sugar production in the country lags behind the past year’s production by 11%, cane arrear amount for the millers reached a whooping Rs 14,000 crore despite subsidy interventions by the government.

As on February 28, the sugar production of the country reached 168.6 lakh tonne, this is lower than last year production during the same period, which was 188.4 lakh tonne.

Country’s largest sugar producing state Maharashtra has crushed 515 lakh tonne of sugarcane to produce 57.1 lakh tonne of sugar with 11.1% of recovery.

Closely following behind is Uttar Pradesh, which has produced 42.75 lakh tonne of sugar from 475 lakh tonne of sugarcane with 8.99% recovery.

UP again has the largest share in the cane arrears amounting to Rs 10,000 crore. Though the central government has announced interest subvention scheme worth Rs 6,000 crore for the ailing sugar sector to pay off mounting arrears, cane farmers still remain unpaid.

Among the other states, Karnataka has produced 31.50 lakh tonne of sugar, Tamil Nadu produced 5.70 lakh tonne and Gujarat produced 8.60 lakh tonne.

Till 28th February 2014, 12 lakh tonne of sugar has been shipped out of country, out of which about 5 lakh tonne has gone as raw sugar. ET reported on Monday that around 4.5 lakh tonne of raw sugar has been exported from the country without availing any subsidy amount in want of government notification on the same.