Sugar production in India rose by 4.54 per cent to 14.25 million tonnes in the first four months of the current marketing year (October to September), buoyed by higher output from key producing states, industry body ISMA said today.
The production of the sweetener was 13.63 million tonnes (MT) in the year-ago period.
ISMA has revised the sugar output estimate downward by 1 MT to 26 MT for this year, which is in line with government's projections but lower than 28.3 MT that was achieved in the 2014-15 marketing year.
As per the latest data released by the Indian Sugar Mills Association (ISMA), higher sugar output was produced even as the number of sugar mills in operation were only 510 in 2015-16 as against 517 mills in the year-ago period.
The association also said 13 sugar mills in Maharashtra and 1 sugar mill each in Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh have closed their crushing operations for the current year.
The sugar output in Maharasthra, the country's leading sugar producing state, increased to 5.44 MT in the October-January period of this marketing year as against 5.43 MT in the year-ago period.
The production in Uttar Pradesh, the country's second biggest sugar producing state, also rose to 3.61 MT from 3.37 MT, while the output in Karnataka jumped to 2.68 MT as compared to 2.31 MT in the said period.
The sugar production in Gujarat rose to 0.69 MT in the first four months of the current year from 0.61 MT in the year-ago period, while in Tamil Nadu, the output improved marginally to 0.23 MT from 0.21 MT in the said period.
Sugar output in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana put together was down at 0.49 MT in October-January period of this year as against 0.49 MT in the same period last year.
According to ISMA, sugar production is estimated to be about 26 MT this year, which is sufficient to meet the domestic requirement.
