Sao Paulo: Sugarcane crushing in the Centre-south region of Brazil has been reported at around 4.38 million tonnes during the second half of March which was below the industry expectations, reports Reuters.
As per the report of the industry group Unica, a total of 63 mills was operating in the region by the end of March as against 25 during the same period last year. Unica was expecting the mills would crush 5 million tonnes of sugarcane during this period.
The positive weather in the country would result in a record crop in 2023/24 (April-March). The mills were not able to crush more cane due to rains in March.
Despite this the mills crushed a good amount of cane this year as during the second half of March last year, the mills had crushed only 1.18 million tonnes.
This year the mills have allocated 33% cane to sugar production as against 11% last year. This is the highest amount of cane allocated for sugar production in the last 11 years.
Sugar mills had crushed 548 million tonnes of cane in the 2022/23 season, 4.6% higher than in 2021/22. The analysts are expecting the mills would crush 600 million tonnes in 2023/24.
