Kenya’s stocks of sugar have fallen below normal levels, causing a creeping shortage in the market, according to a report in Business Daily, adding a new dimension to the raging public debate over sugar imports.
The volume of sugar stocks in all the 11 factories stood at 3,678 tonnes last Friday, way below the 9,000 tonnes that the millers are expected to hold at any given time, the Agriculture Fisheries and Food Authority (AFFA) said. “The steep drop in sugar stocks below the required levels is mainly because of inefficiencies in most of the factories,” AFFA director-general Alfred Busolo said.
Ironically, factories are grappling with over supply and just few months ago complained that they had excess stock.But observers are taking these AFFA statistics with a pinch of salt, as it it viewed as propaganda by government to justify importation of sugar from Uganda under a controversial deal between the two governments.
At current levels, the national sugar stocks are below the required daily output of 4,000 tonnes, representing a steep decline that the regulator has attributed to factory inefficiencies. The AFFA said nearly all millers were operating below their daily capacities, causing a lot of sucrose to go to waste. Inefficiencies are rife in government-owned millers, but the two most successful private factories – West Kenya and Butali – are likely to be holding lots of unsold stocks.
Mr Busolo said there was sufficient raw material to sustain optimal production but which has not been possible because most of the sugar millers are grossly inefficient.
Ramamurthy Thiagarajan, the operations director at Nakumatt Supermarket, told Business Daily that the retailer had not been able to buy enough stocks for its stores because of the dwindling supplies from local millers.
“We are hardly getting enough stocks these days because of shrinking supplies from the manufacturers,” said Mr Thiagarajan, adding that the shortage has partly been caused by the absence of Mumias Sugar Company from the market.
Nakumatt said most of its supplies are currently coming from two millers — Sony and West Kenya — whose stocks could not fully supply the prevailing demand.
Data from the Kenya National Bureau of statistics indicate that the consumer price of sugar has gone up by Ksh5 per kilogramme in the last four months, from Ksh104 in April to Ksh109 last month.
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