At least 29 sugarmills in Sindh province have not yet started crushing of sugar cane despite the passage of the date announced by government for starting the process. It is to be mentioned here that the government was announced November 10 as date for starting crushing season of sugar cane in the province.
There are 32 sugar mills in Sindh out of which only three mills have started crushing process, while the others are least interested in starting crushing due to their ongoing dispute with the provincial government, source at Pakistan Standard Quality Control Authority (PSQCA) told Business Recorder on Friday.
In compliance with the government order, the sources said the sugarmills of Matiayri, Sanghar and Tharparkar districts had started crushing process, while the others were delaying crushing of sugar cane, creating hardship for sugar cane growers.
They said that some sugar mills like Thatta Sugar Mills and Dadu Sugar Mills were stopped from operation due to some dispute between the government and management of the mills. The government and the management of sugar mills have started negotiations to resolve the entire disputes as early as possible, they said.
They said that the workers of both sugar mills are facing severe crises due to the ongoing dispute. The administrations of sugar mills are also facing problems due to high cost of transportation, which is causing delay in supply of sugar cane s to mills.
Citing increase in oil price as reason, the transporters have increased their fares, they said. About the quality of sugar, they said that the government had issued a notification on October 11, 2008 instructing the management of all sugar mills to get license from PSQCA so as to improve the quality of sugar in the country.
To a query, the sources said the government had imported raw sugar from India overcome shortage of essential commodity in the country last year but due to bad quality of the imported sugar, the government had decided to check imported sugar through PSQCA to provide quality sugar to consumer.
Meanwhile, the sources in Pakistan Sugar Mills Association (PSMA) said that lighting up of boilers was part of crushing season and most of the sugar in the province have already fired up their boilers and would start crushing ver soon.
They said that during 2007-08 a record 4.7 million tonnes of sugarcane was produced in the country, out of which the Sindh province's contribution was 1.56 million tonnes. But during the current fiscal year, the said, the country sugar cane output would remain 30 to 40 per cent low than the previous year's due to low rainfall and skyrocketing prices of fertilisers.
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