The introduction of a quality yield based payment system for the sugar industry has seen better cane yields arriving at the country’s sugar mills this year says the Fiji Sugar Corporation executive chairman Abdul Khan.
Mr Khan said the full implementation of the quality based payment system would begin by next year.
“We are currently running it (quality payment system) parallel with the normal cane payment system this year but it will be fully implemented by next year,” Mr Khan said.
“But we have already seen a change in the cane quality coming to the four mills which is a positive sign.”
Mr Khan says better yields mean quality sugar and with the preferential agreement with the European Union coming to a conclusion in 2017, Fiji’s sugar will be in the global markets competing with other sugar producing nations.
“We are still negotiating with the EU to move it ( preferential agreement) to 2020 or even beyond but the more the quality the sugar, the better it is for us and our markets,” Mr Khan added.
Meanwhile, Fiji’s four sugar mills have crushed a little more than 1.1million tonnes of sugarcane producing more than 121,000 tonnes of sugar for Fiji’s market.
Mr Khan has also indicated that the Penang and Labasa mills are likely to seize crushing towards the end of next month while Lautoka and Ba will conclude in November.
-ENDS-