Sugar Cane Pricing Woes

The article “The Sugar Industry in Maharashtra” by Pradeep Chavan (EPW, 24 February 2018) overlooks the elephant in the room, which is the mismatch between sugar cane prices and sugar prices. This is a fundamental problem afflicting the sugar industry not only in Maharashtra, but throughout India.

Sugar cane farmers are a very strong pressure group because they are concentrated in a small area and there is a visible big “enemy” in the form of the sugar baron. India has reached a situation where the price of sugar cane keeps rising; cultivation of sugar cane keeps increasing; sugar production keeps increasing, while surplus sugar causes its price to fall. This leads to sugar cane price arrears. This cycle is occasionally broken because of crop failure or other extraneous causes.