adminThe producer price for raw sugar in Zimbabwe this year has decreased by 8 percent to $517 per tonne from last year’s closing price, an official has said.
At the end of the last marketing season the price for raw sugar was $564 per tonne.
Sugarcane harvesting for the 2014/15 crop started early this month and is expected to run until November.
Commercial Sugarcane Producers’ Association chairman Mr Tawanda Mafurutu attributed the decline to the continued influx of imported sugar and sugar products.
He said the prices were likely to tumble further.
“This year the price of raw sugar is lower because of the poor demand of locally produced sugar which is being choked by imports, that is why we are getting lower prices than last year,” he said.
“If imports are not minimised, we don’t see the producer price of raw sugar increasing; it will actually decrease and this will have a negative impact on our operations and returns.”
Like cotton, the price of sugar cane is largely determined on the international market.
“Always as farmers, we need prices that will enable us to go back to the field and be able to purchase all the required inputs to increase production,” Mr Mafurutu added.
To protect the local sugar industry, Government has introduced a 10 percent import duty and surtax on sugar after local sugar millers lobbied Government to effect protectionist measures.
Sugarcane is grown commercially in the south-eastern parts of Zimbabwe at estates that include Triangle, Hippo Valley and Chisumbanje.
Prior to the successful land reform programme, sugarcane production was a monopoly of Tongaat Hulett, a South African company. — New Ziana.
Online Reporter