Uttar Pradesh must emerge as biggest sugar producer in country: Assocham

LUCKNOW: As UP has the largest area under cane production, it must emerge as a biggest contributor to India's total sugar output, says an Assocham study.

"With UP having the biggest area under sugarcane production, it needs to share more responsibility in increasing India's overall sugar productivity," said the study titled 'Indian Sugar Industry: The way forward'.

"Tamil Nadu has the highest yield of over 100 metric tonne per hectare despite having third highest share of about 12 per cent in terms of sugarcane production and fourth highest share in terms of area under sugarcane production," it added.

It said that Maharashtra recorded highest share of about 33 per cent with about 80 lakh tonnes of sugar produced as of 2012-13 closely followed by UP which had about 31 per cent share with about 75 lakh tonnes of sugar production.

The study said that UP with highest area under production and also the one with highest level of sugarcane production was not the biggest producer of sugar in the country.

It said that UP also lags behind in terms of sugar recovery in the country as Maharashtra had the highest recovery of 11.25 per cent followed by Karnataka and Gujarat which had 10.4 per cent and 10.6 per cent respectively as of 2012-13.

However, a worrisome aspect emerges from the recovery statistics as it is seen that all the major sugar producing states have seen their recovery drop over the period 2001-02 to 2012-13, the study said.

"One of the reasons for such a trend is the fact that sugar prices in UP are already among the country's highest, thanks to high cane prices set by the state, which has squeezed mills' ability to raise prices and improve profitability," national secretary general of Assocham D S Rawat said.