July 13, 2015
Sugaronline | http://goo.gl/9SRN0B
The average sugar recovery of 11.05% achieved by 65 working sugar factories in 16 districts of the State during 2014/15 marks a marginal increase of 0.08% over the preceding season when the recovery was 10.9%, according to India's The Hindu newspaper.
As per seasonal performance analysis of different sugar mills in the State, carried out by city-based S. Nijalingappa Sugar Institute (SNSI), the highest average recovery of 12.3% was achieved by only a mill in Uttara Kannada followed by 11.79% achieved by nine sugar mills in Bagalkot district and the lowest of 8.84% was in Davangere.
According to SNSI director R.B. Khandagave, 45.082 million tonnes of sugarcane was crushed and produced 4.980 million tonnes of sugar by 65 sugar mills during 2014/15. These figures show an increase of sugarcane crushing by about 67.68 million tonnes and sugar production by about 775,000 tonnes during the year. During 2013/14, the total sugarcane crushed by the mills in the State was 38.3142 million tonnes and the sugar produced was 4.2041 million tonnes.
However, this analysis was based on the information provided by various sugar mills.
But, the sugarcane growers do not agree with the data made available to the SNSI or government have been strongly arguing that the actual sugar recovery% was always more than what is informed to the government. Besides, they have been expressing serious doubts on amount of sugarcane crushed and sugar produced.
The growers had been complaining of some of the factories using faulty weigh bridges or tampered meter over which they have no control, while the officials in the district administration maintained that weigh bridges were checked before the commencement and during crushing season, and whenever their were specific complaints.