The Department of Agriculture – Sugar Regulatory Administration (DA-SRA) has issued Sugar Order (SO) No. 2 allowing the importation of 150,000 metric tons (MT) of refined sugar for crop year 2022-2023.
Based on the directive, 75,000 MT of the maximum volume for importation will be allocated to industrial users including beverage and food manufacturers, while the other 75,000 MT will be for consumers.
“[The] SRA deems it necessary to adopt additional, responsive, and pre-emptive measures to ensure domestic supply and manage sugar prices, in order to achieve the foregoing policy declarations through timely government intervention by way of importation in order to maintain a balanced supply and demand of sugar for domestic consumption,” SO No. 2 noted.
Its issuance followed consultations with sugar industry stakeholders that have submitted their positions and endorsement letters acknowledging the need for an importation program during the said period.
Section 8 stated that registered international sugar traders under the importation program must ensure that their respective allocated volumes shall arrive in the country not later than Nov. 15, 2022.
The SRA earlier issued Sugar Order No. 1 where sugar produced for the crop year from Sept. 1, 2022 to Aug. 31, 2023 will be fully allocated for domestic consumption.
SRA Acting Administrator David John Alba said the country needs around two million MT of domestic raw sugar, but the expected sugar production is only around 1,876,135.36 MT.
“For the meantime because we have a little tightness dahil tight nga sa supply, so local lang muna for the production until we see down the line how’s the production doing,” he said. – With reports from Cleizl Pardilla/AG – gb
