ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Planning, Development and Special Initiatives Ahsan Iqbal directed authorities concerned to prepare a medium-term policy to de-regularise the sugar industry for next 10 years and to submit its report within 15days.
The minister also stressed industries to ensure data-uniformity, crop-zoning and backward integration. He gave directions to concerned ministries to prepare a medium-term framework for development of agriculture industry.
The minister gave these directions, while chairing a meeting of Prime Minister’s Committee on Sugar Stocking, Forecasting and Planning, on Wednesday.
The committee was notified in December last year to develop a foolproof system of monitoring and report authentic position of sugar stocks for timely decisions on exports.
Minister for Industries and Production Rana Tanvir Hussain, Minister of State for Finance Ali Pervez Malik, Director General Land Information and Management System Rawalpindi, chairman and member (IR operations) FBR, joint director General Intelligence Bureau, executive director Sustainable Development Policy Institute, deputy director general trade Pakistan Bureau of Statistics, senior member Pakistan Sugar Mills Association (PSMA), director general Agriculture Policy Institute, senior joint secretary Ministry of Industries and Production, Member Industries Ministry of Planning and other relevant officials participated in the meeting.
The minister said that the world’s most productive mills have effective recovery rates but Pakistan’s sugar mills are inefficient in terms of recovery rates. He said that the three most important targets for the sugar industry should be recovering more sugar, producing surplus sugar and exporting surplus to other countries. “By making a medium term policy for government to de-regularise the sugar industry, the next 10 years can be spent following the planned vision,” the minister said, directing the meeting participants to make a committee for achieving the task.
As suggested by the minister, the committee would be chaired by chief statistical officer and must include representatives from Ministry of industries, the FBR, PSMA and SUPARCO. He directed the relevant ministries to prepare a 15 days’ report.
The minister stressed, “Planning Ministry is dedicated to facilitate active forecasting and ensure strategic decision making to promote the development and de-regularisation of sugar industry.
He said, “A medium-term master plan should cover at least 10 years and provide a vision regarding how much productivity is expected to gain from a specified area of land.” He said that the industries sector must get beyond production obsession and ensure backward integration, assuring the industrial stakeholders that their problems will be solved on priority. He also affirmed government’s commitment to balance the need to support domestic sugar producers with ensuring adequate supply and stable prices for local consumers.
Referring to the weak link between production and productivity, the minister said that Pakistan is the fifth largest sugar producer in the world but in terms of yield, its ranking is alarmingly low. He also urged maximising the agricultural portfolio of Pakistan through crop zoning. “Whether it is edible oil, wheat, cotton or sugar sector that needs to be made self-sufficient, crop zoning can help local governments to designate areas of land for farming and protect them from incompatible land uses,” he said.
He also said that backward integration can help the sugar industries achieve faster growth as evident from the success of FMCGs that follow backward integration. Pakistan’s ranking in the bottom one third countries of the world in terms of productivity yield can be used as a motivating factor for implementing better policies, he emphasised.
Senior member of PSMA also briefed the minister that in the previous years, availability of acquiring accurate data had been a persistent problem for the association. He acknowledged the role of FBR as it worked with Sugar Mills Association last year for the first time to review data. He suggested taking data from one source to maintain accuracy.
The representative also said that due to most sugar mills not providing data on time, correct and uniform figures are not reported. “Technically sugar prices should decrease after every successful export but by providing protection to consumers, the sugar mills have been paralysed financially.” PSMA also suggested fixing a date to review 12 months’ performance of mills.
Addressing the meeting, the planning minister said that it is imperative for all institutes of government to maintain effective coordination. He also advised the stakeholders to establish coordination with SUPARCO for satellite-based data gathering. He said, “The problem of data variance should be solved as soon as possible by involving experts and researchers to ensure that data sets used by all institutes are unified.”
Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
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