India can easily export 1 mt sugar if output reaches 24.5 mt

India, the world's second biggest sugar producer but largest consumer, can export up to one million tonnes of sweetener provided the country's output touches the targeted 24.5 million tonnes this year. “Even at 24.5 million tonnes of production, we can easily export 0.5-1 million tonnes under the open general licence (OGL)," a senior government official said told reporters today. If the country's sugar output by the month-end reaches five million tonnes, it will help the government to take the call on regularising exports, the official said. Due to unseasonal rain in key cane growing regions, cane crushing activity has delayed, the official added. The government has banned unrestricted exports of sugar under OGL since February 2009 in the wake of a fall in sugar output in 2008-09 crop year. Recently, Food and Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar said the government will review the sugar production situation in the 2010-11 crop year (October-September) by the end of this month before deciding to permit exports. "I will take the review of the production report (sugar) in the third week of December and then will take a decision (on exports)," Pawar had said. The Food Ministry has pegged country's sugar production in the 2010-11 sugar year (October-September) at 24.5 million tonnes against the domestic demand of 22.5-23 million tonnes. After a gap of two seasons, the country's sugar production is estimated to be higher than domestic demand this year. In 2008-09 and 2009-10, India's sugar production stood at 14.7 million tonnes and 19 million tonnes, respectively. The government recently allowed the export of about 1 million tonnes of sugar through the Advance License Scheme (ALS), under which mills are required to meet an equivalent export obligation by March, 2011. Sugar mills imported over 2 million tonnes of sugar between 2004 and 2008 through the ALS to make up for the shortage in domestic production.