THE Sugar Council on Wednesday said they will support a probe to be conducted by the Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) that would look into reports of lower farmgate prices of raw sugar.'We strongly support SRA's move to investigate why sugar prices have been lower than the P3,000 per 50-kilo bag, which SRA itself had forecasted before the start of the milling season,' the Sugar Council said.Vendors at the Paco Market in Manila repack sugar on Wednesday, Jan. 18, 2023. PHOTO BY MIKE ALQUINTO Earlier this month, SRA Administrator Pablo Luis Azcona noted that the price movement has been abnormal, with raw sugar prices fluctuating from P2,550 to P3,000 and down again in just two weeks.This prompted the SRA to launch an investigation over this matter.'Related to this, the farmgate price of P2,760 per 50-kilo bag translates to only P55.20 per kilo in the retail market,' said the council.'But in reality, the actual retail price of sugar continues to hover between P80 [and] P100 per kilo ... This also proves that sugar farmers are not causing the high retail prices,' it added.In a bid to lift farmgate prices, the SRA has halted the release of sugar imports. This would apply to 150,000 metric tons of the commodity and keep prices directly paid to farmers at around P3,000 per bag.'Despite the fact that the average retail price of sugar remains the same, the average farmgate price of raw sugar, which hovered between P2,500 [and] P2,750 per bag during the first two weeks of CY (calendar year) 2023-2024 continues to go down, to the detriment of the sugar farmers, allegedly by reason of oversupply,' said the SRA.The Sugar Council comprises various groups including the Confederation of Sugar Producers' Associations Inc., the National Federation of Sugarcane Planters and the Panay Federation of Sugarcane Farmers.
