Haryana sugar mills clear outstanding payments to farmers

Chandigarh, Nov 29 (UNI) Due to the efforts of the state government the sugarmills in Haryana have cleared pending payments amounting to about Rs 520 crore that were due to the farmers for the cane supplied by them during the last crushing season.

Disclosing this here today Agriculture Minister Harmohinder Singh Chatha said while the Cooperative Sugarmills had paid the sugarcane growers about Rs 250 crore, the remaining amount was cleared by the three private sugarmills of Yamunanagar, Bhadson and Naraingarh.

He said a total quantity of about 420 lakh quintals of sugarcane was crushed in the last season producing 40.94 lakh quintals of sugar. About 818 lakh quintals of sugarcane was produced from an area of 1.27 lakh hectares during the last season, thereby achieving the highest ever average productivity level of 644 quintals per hectare.

Out of the total production, 50 to 55 per cent was crushed to obtain sugar, the remaining was used by cane crushers to produce Khandsari and Gur.

Mr Chatha pointed out that as the state government had increased the sugarcane prices to Rs 138, Rs 128 and Rs 126 per quintal for early, mid and late varieties respectively, the farmers would be paid Rs 30 crore more than the amount paid during the year 2005- 06.

In the current crushing season about 1,017 lakh quintals of sugarcane was expected to be produced.

There are 15 sugarmills in the state with a total capacity of 44,550 tonnes capacity Daily (TCD). Out of these 11 were in the cooperative sector and remaining four in private.

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