The government has convened a meeting of sugar sector stakeholders here on Saturday to decide sugarcane pricing controversy, sources said.
The Agriculture Prices Commission chairman will chair the meeting. Senior officials of the food, industries and production and commerce ministries, federal and provincial cane commissioners and representatives of the growers and mill-owners will attend the meeting.
The growers and sugar mill-owners are engaged in bitter controversy over sugarcane prices from the very beginning of the crushing season. In some parts the growers have withheld the crop.
The situation is getting worse with the passage of each day. The growers are not ready to supply sugarcane to the mill-owners without getting their asking price that ranges between Rs 60-70 per 40-kg and the mill-owners are not willing to pay such high rates, the sources added.
The stand-off is hurting the consumers as profiteers, whose majority belongs to the mill-owners, are exploiting the market to push up the prices of the commodity in the open market.
One cannot believe that the sugar prices can go up by Rs 6 per kg right from the beginning of the crushing season. Sugar prices are ranging between Rs 33-34 per kg for the last two weeks.