The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Friday allowed sugarcane growers to sell their crops to other provinces.
The judgement was pronounced by Justice Jawad Hassan. The sugar mills have challenged the decision of the Punjab cane commissioner to lift an inter-provincial ban from sugarcane export to other provinces in the Lahore High Court (LHC).
Declaring the act of selling sugarcane to other provinces by the growers as a right move, the LHC said in its decision that sugar mills have no right to weaken the farmer financially. The rights of the farmers are protected in the constitution of Pakistan and there is no law that stops them from selling their sugarcane to other provinces, the judgement read.
Earlier, the cane commissioner Punjab had directed the deputy commissioners of all the districts to inspect the sugarcane procurement being carried out by the sugar mills in their respective localities to snub the practice of ‘off the book’ purchase.
Previously, the Pakistan Sugar Mills Association (PSMA) had informed the Ministry of Industries that the millers were facing serious shortage of raw material and could shut down their operations in the near future.
In a letter addressed to Industries & Production Minister Muhammad Hammad Azhar, titled ‘non-availability of sugarcane due to high prices demanded by farmers’, PSMA Chairman Iskander Khan stated that the farmers were trying to manipulate their position by holding cane supplies.
The PSMA had said that sugar mills all over the country had commenced the sugarcane crushing season for 2020-2021 as per the directions by the respective provincial governments. However, growers had not started sugarcane harvesting in most regions in the country.
“The farmers are demanding a high sugarcane price compared to the government notified sugarcane price of Rs200 per 40kg,” the letter read. “Owing to the current scarce supply of sugarcane, it is feared that the sugar mills facing shortage of cane will be forced to shut down their units within a week.”
However, I&P Minister Hamad Azhar had said that there was no shortage of sugarcane in Punjab. “When the government negotiates with mills on high prices of sugar, they say that it’s a result of demand and supply, but when it comes to the pricing of sugarcane for farmers, they [millers] depart from the same logic.”
