Govt issues notification lifting complete ban on sugar exports

New Delhi, Jan 24 (UNI) In view of the comfortable production in the current sugar year, the government has issued a notification completely lifting the ban on sugar exports that was imposed on July 4, 2006.

The Union Cabinet had already taken a decision, at its meeting onJanuary 11, to remove total ban on export of sugar.

The Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) had issued a notification here last night in which it mentioned that ''the prohibition shall not apply to exports of sugar, executed under validreleases order issued by Directorate of sugar, up to the limit executed by the government, after which fresh approvals will be taken for further releases.'' Earlier, for partially restoring the permission, the government had allowed export of refined product under Advance Licensing System (ALS) on December 18 last in lieu of raw sugar imports in the wake of low sugar production, which was caused by low availability of sugarcane in previous seasons.

The industry had been strongly pressing the government to allowexport of sugar when the international prices were hovering at about 450 dollars a tonne.

The complete ban on exports of sugar is lifted when the prices have now crashed to about 320 dollars a tonne in the global market.

The sugar industry had imported about two million tonnes of rawsugar with re-export obligation of refined product during crisis period.

''With the complete lifting of ban on exports, the industry is expected to export about two million tonnes of sugar from the current sugar season's production in addition to one million tonne re-export obligation during the year,'' said Mr Vinay Kumar, Managing Director of the National Federation of Cooperative Sugar Factories (NFCSF).

The sugar production during October 2006 to September 2007 season is pegged at 240 lakh tonnes and with the opening stock of 40 lakh tonnes at the start of the season, the total availability of sugar in the country is expected to be about 280 lakh tonnes whereas the domestic annual consumption is in the range of 190-195 lakh tonnes.

UNI