Chennai: The Consortium of Indian Farmers Association has said that it is the sugar mills' responsibility to market excess production of sugar rather than stopping procurement of sugarcane. It was reacting to an announcement by the Indian Sugarmill Owners' Association in this connection. It also demanded that the mills pay arrears payable to farmers.
Consortium's state general secretary R.V. Giri said that while sugar consumption in the state was around 230 lakh tonne per year, there was no market for around 40-50 lakh tonne excess sugar.
Prior to 2014, sugarmills released only a certain quantity of sugar as monthly quota. But, the system was changed after repeated suggestions by the mills to government. Now, there was no restriction on the quantity to be released to the market. The consortium also demanded that the state and the Central Governments should hold a meeting with farmers to thrash out various issues, Giri said.
