Recently in sugar beet Category

British Sugar’s parent company, Associated British Foods, has announced a “record” set of results for the last financial year.

Group pre-tax profit for the year to 18 September was up 26% on last year at £825m, on turnover 10% higher at £10.2bn.

Four out of five ABF business segments reported record profits and agriculture almost equalled last year’s record.

In a year in which British Sugar effectively cut the price paid to growers with its new pricing formula, ABF said there was a “substantial” improvement in profitability of its sugar business, which grew revenue by 32% and operating profit from £168m to £240m.

Sales were boosted by a full year’s contribution from Azucarera in Spain, which ABF acquired last April, but the firm said there was also good growth in its UK and Chinese sugar margins.

“Favourable growing conditions and improved beet yields led to production of 1.3m tonnes of sugar which was 9% more than the previous year. Profit and margin were also significantly ahead.”

Excellent factory performance, firmer sugar pricing, a stronger euro and 120,000t of non-quota exports to the world market also boosted the results.

Are you happy with the price for sugar beet or is British Sugar cashing in at growers’ expense? Tell us what you think in the FWi Forum.

As an enthusiastic skier, the sight of snow seldom fails to excite me. But sitting in another two-hour traffic jam on the way to work this morning, even I was starting to feel I'd seen enough.

Many farmers will have reached the same conclusion far quicker, as the cold snap takes a toll on their patience and their businesses.

Precise estimates have yet to emerge as to the overall cost of the "big freeze", though it is likely to run into the £ millions.

As we've been reporting on FWi this week, all manner of costs have gone up. Red diesel has firmed by about 5p/litre, with many farmers now having to pay over 50p/litre. The cost of heating oil has also risen as demand increases.

Animal fodder is getting costlier too, with auctioneers this week reporting a 20%-30% rise in the price of hay. Conventional bales have been touching £4 a bale for top quality meadow hay, with "Claas Quads" making over £50 a bale at Alexanders of Huntingdon's annual sale...

If ever there was a contender for Private Eye's "Muckspreader" column, this has to be it!

It has emerged that the EU is facing a massive increase in sugar production this season, as warm wet conditions have led to a bumper crop. Producer body CIBE reckons the EU as a whole will have a sugar surplus of around 2.4m tonnes.

This is way in excess of the 1.37m tonnes it is allowed to export under the terms of a WTO ruling reached in 2004.

That was based on a complaint by Australia, Brazil and Thailand which had argued that the EU was "dumping" its surpluses on the world market.

But that was in the days when world prices were way below EU levels. The situation is very different today, with the global shortage of sugar leading to a doubling in prices in just 12 months.

The response suggested by CIBE is for the EU to increase the export ceiling for 2010, so that, instead of having to stockpile about 1m tonnes of surplus sugar, processors can sell it to the world market and help relieve the global shortage...

2009 has been a year of ups and downs in the world of agri-business. Prices have reached record highs for some commodities, and dismal lows for others.

Some businesses have gone to the wall, while others have flourished.

But how much do you remember from the past 12 months? Are you a "Business Numpty" or a "Business Genius".

To test your knowledge, I have devised the following quiz:

Richard and Judy, Posh and Becks, Morecombe and Wise - when it comes to natural couplings, it has to be said that the NFU and British Sugar make unlikely bed-fellows.

But the fact that these two long-standing antagonists will have to bury their differences and learn to get along was made crystal clear at a briefing I attended with the NFU last Friday.

All too often, the long term interests of the British sugar sector have been compromised because the two biggest stakeholders have been at loggerheads.

When it comes to negotiations in Brussels in particular, this lack of unity has encouraged DEFRA to fight more strongly for the UK's cane refining industry, rather than the UK's beet refining industry. That, at least, was the view of NFU sugar board chairman Will Martin.

That has to change. Further reform of the EU sugar regime is just around the corner and the EU Commission may well be interested in getting rid of quotas, as it plans for milk, and introducing far greater market liberalisation....

By Robert Harris, FW arable editor

Both the NFU and British Sugar are, apparently, "pleased to inform you" that they have agreed a price of £26/t for 2010/11 beet.

So they state in a letter that went out to growers after this week's conclusion of the protracted price talks.

British Sugar is right to be pleased - very pleased. It has refused to budge on its price set almost two months ago. It will pay farmers £1/t less for beet than it did last year, and will only pay an additional £1/t on the transport allowance if a framework for a longer-term agreement is reached in the next few months.

But what right has the NFU to be pleased? It has had to backtrack all the way, ever since it's initial, wildly optimistic £34.50/t punt back in April. It has done nothing for growers and damaged its credibility as a negotiator.....

When it comes to holiday reading, the John Nix Farm Management Pocketbook is never going to make to the list of "must be seen with" books to take to the airport.

No, holidays are about getting away from it all, hence my decision to pack The Strange Last Voyage of Donald Crowhurst and the latest Sebastian Faulks, Devil May Care, when throwing my things together in haste this morning. (Yes, I'm off for some late summer sun in Greece.)

But that's not to suggest that the Nix Pocketbook is not a cracking good read. The new 40th anniversary edition shows that feed wheat variable costs have fallen by a third for the forthcoming 2010 harvest since the expensive 2008/09 growing year - down from £62/t to £42/t.

Who knows what the price of wheat will be in 12 months' time, but the £20 drop in variable costs at least more than compensates for the £10/t drop in wheat prices compared with this time last year. Good news for arable farmers.

Dairy returns are also seen rising in 2010. "Despite a lower milk price, higher cull and calf prices, coupled with lower costs of concentrate feed, fuel and fertiliser will push the gross margin per forage hectare up slightly," it suggests....

In less than a fortnight, British Sugar will open its factory gates and start the job of processing the 2009 beet crop.

It stands to make a lot of money from the activity, with international sugar prices at a 30-year high, the weak pound protecting the sector from imports and the value of bioethanol also on the way up.

Yet the task of agreeing terms with growers for the 2010 crop still hangs in the balance, with DEFRA poised to come in as arbitrator if talks collapse this week.

The two sides are tantalisingly close, with the NFU indicating that it will accept last year's price of £27/t as a "bridging" value for 2010, (though it still wants £34.50/t as the long-term price to give growers "the security to commit to the crop for future years").

In contrast, British Sugar says £26/t is the most it can pay and growers can either "take it or leave it". The company claimed at the NFU meeting last week that, if it is forced to go up to £27/t, then the 800,000t of "temporary tonnage", linked to the processing of bio-ethanol at Wissington, may be withdrawn.

That all seems highly questionable...

By Paul Spackman

The annual last-minute "bun fight" between British Sugar and the NFU is hotting-up again, despite hopes that a repeat of last year's protracted negotiations could be avoided.

The latest attempt to break the stalemate has come from the NFU, which called on growers to "show solidarity" for its position and attend a meeting next week in which it will discuss the next steps in securing a higher beet price for 2010.

Earlier this year the NFU opened the negotiations with a demand for £34.50/t, which British Sugar quickly called "unrealistic". Since then things have progressed about as well as an Australian Ashes tour and it may take more than next week's meeting to get British Sugar to budge.

Of course, if every beet grower in the country comes together in Peterborough on Wednesday (2 September) and all agree a common, reasonable 'asking price' then perhaps British Sugar will have no choice but to listen...

When it comes to negotiating sugar beet prices, the NFU can hardly be accused of lacking ambition.

The £34.50/t it is demanding for 2010 beet has certainly grabbed the headlines in recent months, representing as it does a 33% increase on this year's crop value.

The NFU argues this is necessary to give farmers the confidence to invest and ensure a long-term supply of beet for the nation's sugar factories.

Not surprisingly, British Sugar bosses disagree vehemently, pointing out that, even at this year's £26/t, they were able to secure all the beet they needed to operate at full capacity.

Of course, any price negotiation is about compromise, so aiming high and settling for something less is just normal practice. That was certainly the case last year, when beet growers demanded £30/t and settled for £26/t.

There is little doubt that BS can afford to pay more....