EXTENDING the crushing date would mean more losses for cane growers, says outgoing Sugar Industry Minister Charan Jeath Singh.
He said the profit share formula of 30 per cent to the Fiji Sugar Corporation and 70 per cent to the grower meant the costs of keeping the mill open would be carried by the two parties.
“It costs about $50,000 per day to run the mill,” said Mr Singh.
“If we keep the mill open then the cost would come from the sale of the sugar produced for that season.”
The total process of sugar and its sale, he said, will have 70 per cent going to the farmer and 30 per cent going to FSC.
“If we keep running the mill, farmers will also be affected too.”
Mr Singh said the Government had done its best to keep the mill open.
“I had instructed FSC and the (Sugar Industry) Tribunal to keep the mill going but if we are getting lesser and lesser number of trucks daily it does not make sense to keep it open.
“If we extend the crushing date, it will mean both parties will lose more.
“So, farmers saying to keep the mill open for five or six trucks of cane coming to the mill, it does not make any sense.
“So, finally we had to decide ‘no’.”
The Rarawai Sugar Mill closed on January 12 despite calls from growers to extend the closing date.
Stand over cane ‘not new’
HAVING stand over cane after a crushing season was not new, says outgoing Sugar Minister Charan Jeath Singh.
Responding to issues raised by political figures and concerned growers, Mr Singh said the 2025 crushing season had a reasonable amount of stand over cane despite the short closure of the Rarawai Sugar Mill last year.
“It is a historical thing that happens every year when farmers cannot find labourers for harvesting, and then of course the farmers themselves are not motivated to harvest the cane for one reason
or another,” he said.
“But a farmer has to work hard, and you cannot expect FSC to do everything.
“FSC is giving you the grants, money to plant the cane, look after it and also harvest it.”
He said despite the stand over cane each season, the industry was working towards increasing its cane production.
“We want to increase our annual production by 200,000 tonnes despite the stand over cane.
“No body should blame FSC. We all know for the 2025 crushing season we had the mill fire in Rarawai and for that reason we could not take all of the cane there.
“But despite all of these problems and the tough time we had to go through we managed to clear as much cane as possible.”
Mr Singh said the weather, however, had not been favourable to growers over the past few weeks of the 2025 crushing season.
