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  • Indian sugar production will exceed 26.5m tonnes this season.
  • Mills in Maharashtra have not shut down as fast as expected.
  • Production elsewhere has been slower than originally estimated.

India: Production Pace Slowing At Normal Rate  

  • India has now produced 21.58m tonnes of sugar, nearly 6m tonnes less than last season. Fortnightly sugar production has been slowing down at a similar rate to previous seasons.
  • 321 mills remain crushing, compared to 354 at this time last season (70 fewer mills didn’t operate at all this season).
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  • We have, therefore, increased our Maharashtrian sugar production estimate by 750k tonnes.
  • However, reductions in our estimates for Uttar Pradesh (UP), Karnataka (KN) and other states mean that overall production will increase by just over 100k tonnes.
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Uttar Pradesh: India’s Largest Producer  

  • We expect Uttar Pradesh production to total 12.45m tonnes this season, 250k tonnes below our previous estimate.
  • This is because there was not the usual increase in fortnightly production at the start of March.
  • So far, 8.72m tonnes of sugar has been produced leaving 3.75m left of our estimate.
  • This is 70% of the total remaining production in India.
  • Uttar Pradesh will be the only state to see increase production this year, due to an increase in cane acreage and a higher yielding cane variety.
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Maharashtra: Estimate Increase   

  • We think Maharashtra will produce 6m tonnes of sugar this season.
  • However, sugar production will still fall nearly 50% compared to the previous crop.
  • Maharashtra has made 5.6m tonnes of sugar so far; fortnightly production remained over 500k tonnes.
  • Availability of cane has not been as bad as first expected and mills continue to work.
  • 90 mills remain in operation, just four fewer than last year.
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Karnataka: Game Over  

  • Sugar production in Karnataka is all but over, so we are reducing our estimate here by 200k tonnes.
  • 80% of mills have shut and production in the last fortnight dropped below 100k tonnes.
  • We expect less than 100k tonnes more sugar to be added to the 3.3m tonnes already produced.
  • This means production will fall 25% compared to last season.
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Czapp’s Interactive Data Section  

To access this data in our Interactive Data section, select the tile highlighted in yellow below…

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…and you’ll be taken to the latest crop production report.

Ben Seed

Ben joined CZ’s analysis team in 2016 on a year long internship before returning to the University of Bath to complete an Economics Degree. Since re-joining in August 2018, Ben has led the data insights team in expanding the range and quality of data available internally and to clients through CZ App. Ben spent 3 months in CZ’s Singapore and Bangkok offices to expand his knowledge of the region and help roll out the latest data processes. He is now also responsible for the Sugar Market View published each week on CZ App.

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