Bitter Tale Of Sugar

Sugar is one of the essential consumer commodities widely used in food and drink items. A global research reveals that taste is primary factor in driving the consumers’ purchase. Although sugar is extracted from plants and forms a part of balanced diet, doctors advise reducing the intake of refined sugar because a diet in high sugar causes multiple health problems. However, the medical caveat has nothing to do with production, consumption and trade of sugar. It has become an integral part of our kitchen. People start their day with a fresh cup of tea and most people still prefer tea or coffee mixed with sugar. When sugar supply sees a shortage or its price soars, the consumers feel bitter, affecting people as well as the economy. 

Nepal has bitter story of sugar despite its long history of sugarcane cultivation and sugar production. The country’s southern plains have favourable topographic, climatic and edaphic conditions that suit for sugarcane farming. Nepali farmers have been cultivating sugarcane for more than a century but its commercial cultivation started with the establishment of Morang Sugar Mills Limited. This prompted the commercial farming of sugarcane, the only source of sugar production in Nepal. The country used to export raw sugar to EU countries under the Everything but Arms (EBA) trade preference in 2003 but now it imports 50 per cent of sugar as the domestic production cannot meet the local demand. 

Although the country began producing sugar more than seven decade ago, it is still struggling to attain self-reliance on this item. Once 31 sugar mills operated across the country but now only 10 of them exist owing to the decline in the sugarcane production. According to the news report of this daily, they produce around 130,000 tonnes of sugar annually whereas Nepal’s annual sugar consumption stands at around 260,000 tonnes. Until a decade ago, Nepal used to produce as much as 230,000 tonnes of sugar annually. As the sugarcane farmers fail to get the payment of their produce in time, they are disinclined to cultivate sugarcane and have shifted to producing other crops such as maize, wheat and paddy. 

In the fiscal year 2017/18, the production of sugarcane was 3.558 million tonnes but it declined to 3.159 million tonnes in 2021/22. This is because the area of cultivation decreased to 62,567 hectares in 2021/22 from 78,609 hectares of land in 2017/18. Although the sugar mills have cleared most of their arrears, many farmers are still unpaid. Recurring conflict between the farmers and sugar mills over the payment of sugarcane shows that this sector is plagued by deep malaise. Defective policy and corrupt practice of people in authority have negatively affected the production and smooth supply of sugar. We need to develop a functional mechanism to ensure problem-free supply of sugar for good. An alleged collusion between people in authority and the traders that has earned bad repute for frequently creating artificial scarcity and price increase of sugar should be ended once and for all. 

Attaining self-reliance in sugar should be the priority and for that we need to have an action plan to increase the production and export of sugar. Now the government should bring effective measures to ensure the fair price of sugarcane farmers, control black-marketing of sugar, and artificial shortage of sugar so that the consumers are not frequently haunted by its scarcity and price hike. It is also necessary to strengthen the market monitoring for the smooth supply of sugar.