Short supply is boon for Anakapalli jaggery traders

With the sugarcane itself bringing in the moolah, farmers of Uttar Pradesh, the heartland of sugar, and Maharashtra see no reason to get into the business of jaggery.

This has come as a boon to the jaggery traders of Anakapalli because short supply means they can even sell their stocks.

Cashing in on this scenario, traders in the Anakapalli jaggery market have begun moving out stocks from cold storage units to meet the demand. Traders stocked about Rs 31 crore worth of jaggery in the last five months in cold storage units.

"Due to attractive price offered by sugar mills on sugarcane, farmers in Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra preferred to sell their sugarcane. This led to a significant fall in the jaggery production in these states during this season. Owing to this reason, we are expecting a good demand for Anakapalli jaggery in other states," IVR Nageswara Rao, President, Anakapalli Jaggery Traders Association, told Business Standard.

In the last five days, about 60 loads of jaggery stocks moved from the cold storage plants and were exported to Tata Nagar, Orissa and Kolkata markets. Traders are getting a margin of Rs 5,000 on each truckload jaggery, Rao said.

Though last month, Anakapalli market received about 8 lakh lumps, this month it is expected to come down to 1.5 lakh lumps.

At present, between 5,000 and 6,000 lumps are coming to the market as compared to 20,000 lumps per day in the month of May. Rao said added that fresh stocks will start arriving from August onwards.

During 2003-04 jaggery season (July to June), Anakapalli market received about 39 lakh lumps (each lump contains 15 kg) of jaggery, whereas during this season up to end of April, the market received about 50 lakh lumps of jaggery.

One of the reasons that helped farmers produce more jaggery this season as compared to the last season was traders paid good prices. During 2003-04, traders paid on an average Rs 90 per 10 kg of jaggery whereas in current season, jaggery farmers are getting on an average Rs 110 per 10 kg of jaggery, K Buchi Raju, senior trader, said.

During the last jaggery season, Anakapalli traders stocked about 1,600 loads (each load contains 10 tonnes) of jaggery at different cold storage units, while this season they have stocked about 2,500 loads of jaggery.