THE price of sugar in Philippine markets is expected to stabilize at P70 to P80 per kilo by November, Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) acting administrator David Alba said.
Alba on Tuesday said milling has started in Bacolod City, and refineries will soon be in full operation.
SRA said by this time local sugar will flood Philippine markets and this will bring down the price of sugar, which is currently at P100 per kilo.
“Barring another typhoon… the sugarcanes are looking good. Hopefully, if this continues, we’ll have more sugar than what we estimated,” Alba told reporters.
This is also the time that imported sugar will come in, as Sugar Order No. 2 explicitly states that imported sugar must arrive no later than November 15.
He added, “150,000 tons as a number is nothing but if you’d look at it from our perspective, 150,000 tons is actually 3 million 50-kilo bags. Can you imagine 3 million kilo bags, that’s a lot of sugar.”
“‘Yung mataas na price sa palengke is not the fault of the farmer, the farmer has sold his last sugar last June, umpisa pa lang ulit kami magbenta ngayon,” said Pablo Azcona, planters’ representative to the Sugar Board.
The board also announced that of the 27 warehouses inspected by the Bureau of Customs and the SRA, 21 warehouses accounting for 1.8 million bags have already been cleared.
Only six warehouses with 51,000 bags remain under investigation.
Alba said President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has also cascaded his orders to the new sugar board.
“The marching order of the president who is the secretary of agriculture was to focus on how to increase the production of our farms, that is number 1. And improve RD and E and on the long term, how we can slowly gradually go on mechanization and that is in line on increasing productivity,” he said. (ABS-CBN News)
