Govt to step up sugar sales through ration shops

Ankur Garg (Company Secretary and Compliance Officer) (114773 Points)

11 September 2009

Friday 11 September, 2009.

Govt to step up sugar sales through ration shops

The govt on Thursday said it would sell an additional two kg of sugar at Rs 13.5 a kg to the poor through ration shops during the festival, even as retail price of the sweetener has doubled to Rs 35 in the last one year.

There would not be any increase in the selling price of sugar at ration shops, Food and Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar said, while advising media not to sensationalise the price issue at what he called the "difficult time" of shortages.

Rations shops, which currently sell half-a-kilo of sugar per head per family, will start vending the additional two kg during September or October to below poverty line (BPL) families and also above poverty line families in hilly and north-east states.

On pricing concerns, he asked the media not to compare the current sugar prices with sugar prices prevailing during last season, saying it does not give a correct picture.

"It only adds to the wrong interpretation of the situation,"he said while addressing the annual meeting of the National Federation of Cooperative Sugar Factories in New Delhi.

The problem with such comparison is that there was surplus availability of sugar during the past two sugar seasons that led to fall in price to even below the cost of sugarcane, he said and asked the media to compare the current price with a normal sugar season.

Sugar prices have doubled to Rs 35 per kg in the retail market due to drop in production to 15 MT in 2008-09 season ending this month from 26.4 MT in the previous season.