I gather my previous piece sparked some reaction in the UK about sugar beet prices. First, I would like to clarify that I understated the figure. The €70/t (£60/t) beet price multiplied by the average yield of 70t/ha multiplied by the total area of 70,000ha equates to €343m (£298m) across all the sugar beet farmers, not €4.9m (£4.2m). Sorry for the confusion.

Like I said last time, this will be the highest price ever. My father told me to write it down because it will never happen again. I quietly hope he is wrong.

As there was so much interest, I’ll go into a bit more detail. This high price is only for growers who supply quota sugar. All sugar above the quota, we call C-sugar or (free translation) surplus sugar. For the C-sugar we get a price that is much lower.

The quota is not for free. If you want to supply sugar within the quota you will have to buy it. I don’t know the exact price, but I heard a few weeks ago it was €0.73/kg sugar (£0.64). This is of course very high.

So, for example, 10ha producing 15,000kg sugar/ha would need an investment of €110,000 (£96,000) at a quota price of €0.73 just to be able to supply sugar. Of course, it would be several years until you sell the quota again.

This year, the C-sugar is about €30/t (£26) at 16% sugar and average WIN (extractability). The quota price is €68,80/t (£59.85) at 17.3% sugar and average WIN. Suiker Unie pays this high price also because the subsidiary companies made a good profit, which is calculated through the quota sugar price.

I agree it is a good price for sugar beet, but I didn’t mention the high land prices and the costs to grow it.