• GILBERT P. BAYORAN
The Sugar Council, composed of three major planters’ federations, expressed its willingness to collaborate with other groups, aside from the National Congress of Unions in the Sugar Industry (NACUSIP), to work for the welfare of sugar farmers and workers.
In a statement, Enrique Rojas, president of the National Federation of Sugarcane Planters, said that sugar importation is one of the most important issues that the Sugar Council, NACUSIP, and other industry groups should work on.
While the country currently cannot produce enough sugar to satisfy domestic demand, Rojas said any importation should undergo transparent and inclusive consultations with all affected stakeholders.
The Sugar Council is composed of NFSP, Confederation of Sugar Planters’ Associations, Inc. (CONFED), and Panay Federation of Sugarcane Farmers (PANAYFED).
“Government should publicly disclose the figures used as the basis for the computation of the volume of sugar to be imported, and ensure that the timing of the imported sugar’s arrival will not affect millgate sugar prices,” Rojas emphasized.
During a recent meeting between CONFED president Aurelio Valderrama, Jr. and NACUSIP president Roland de la Cruz, they agreed to engage in issue-based collaboration on sugar industry-related issues.
NACUSIP is the largest federation of labor unions in the sugar industry, including agrarian reform beneficiaries. Roland de la Cruz was recently elected national president of an aggrupation of 61 multi-industry trade unions with collective bargaining agreements and 17 ARBs organizations nationwide.
According to Valderrama, both parties initially agreed to work jointly for “the revision of the SIDA (Sugar Industry Development Act of 2015) and the empowerment of industry stakeholders by pushing for more consultative policy-making by government, especially on sugar importation.”
Rojas said that sugar farmers will appreciate government measures which can demonstrate its concern for the welfare of sugar farmers and workers.
It is hardly comforting to read statements from the Sugar Regulatory Administration that apparently favor traders in this latest export-import scheme, he pointed out.
Rojas referred to the scheme where traders who previously purchased local sugar at a premium price of P2,700 per bag were granted the right to export sugar “at a loss” to the United States, in exchange for rights to import much cheaper sugar from the world market.
“Given that these traders (who participated in the US export trade) will also be given the chance to import refined sugar, the cost of money and other fees they incurred will probably give them just a little profit to recoup their expenses,” Rojas said, quoting a statement from the SRA.
He added that the statement did not sit well with other industry stakeholders, considering that the supposedly “premium purchase price” of P2,700 per bag was lower than sugar prices last Crop Year 2022-2023.
The US export-import scheme is seen as a double-whammy in favor of traders, because they were able to purchase local sugar at lower prices than last crop year and, at the same, these traders could profit more from the rights granted to them by SRA to import much cheaper sugar, Rojas further said.*
