Beet producers due £2.50/t adjustment
Beet producers due £2.50/t adjustment
SUGAR beet growers will receive £2.50 more for each adjusted tonne of contracted beet delivered this campaign, assuming there are no green rate changes before the end of the sugar year in June.
That brings the price near £33/t. Payments for C beet remain around £15 an adjusted tonne.
All figures have been provisionally agreed with the NFU, says British Sugars Robin Limb.
The interim price for contracted beet was set at £30.17/t. BS retained £1.80 to guard against adverse agri-money movements, he explains.
About £1 was also withheld in case BS had to unblock stored sugar. The money acts as a buffer against the price paid by BS for A and B beet and the world market price at which the sugar is sold. In fact, BS blocked a further 42,000t.
However, 30p/t will be deducted from the 1996/97 contract price because carried forward sugar has reduced in value due green £ revaluations. So growers will receive £2.50/t, of which almost two-thirds will be paid in April, the balance in November, says Mr Limb.
With an average of £5/t already paid for adjusted C beet tonnage as transport and late delivery allowance, growers can expect a further £4.50/t in April and the remaining £5.50/t in November, provided the world price remains stable.
• Final sugar production is expected to exceed last years record of 1.47m tonnes, Mr Limb notes.
Growers achieved a record yield of almost 56 adjusted tonnes/ha (22.7t/acre), up 5.6% on 1996.
Provisional figures show sugar content averaged 17.17%, down from 18.04% the previous season. "Root growth was phenomenal, which allowed the crop to grow to some extent at the expense of sugar."
Dirt and crown tares were lower, at 5.45% and 7.15%. However, amino-N levels were slightly higher than 1996. *