UP surpasses Maharashtra as top sugar producer

Uttar Pradesh has surpassed Maharashtra in sugar production in the current season even as 118 sugar mills operated in UP during the period compared to 210 mills that were operational in the western state. UP’s Cane Development and Sugar Mills’ minister Laxmi Narayan Chaudhary said, “UP is ahead of Maharashtra as far as production of sugar is concerned along with a number of other factors.”

Elaborating further, Chaudhary said, “The total sugar produced by Uttar Pradesh in sugar season 2022-2023 is 107.29 lakh tonnes (which includes 3.05 lakh tonnes of Khandsari (physically extracted sugar from liquid jaggery), as compared to 105.30 lakh tonnes by Maharashtra. The area under cane cultivation in Uttar Pradesh is 28.53 lakh hectare (maximum in India) as compared to 14.87 lakh hectare in Maharashtra.”
The sugarcane crushing season runs from October to June. “The sugarcane production in UP has been 2,348 lakh tonnes, while in Maharashtra it was 1,413 lakh tonnes,” Chaudhary said.

He added that total cane crushed by sugar mills in UP in the 2022-2023 season was 1,084.57 lakh tonnes, whereas it was 1,053 lakh tonnes in Maharashtra.
The UP minister also informed that 19.84 lakh tonnes of sugar was diverted to ethanol in Uttar Pradesh, while in Maharashtra, it was 15.70 lakh tonnes.
Pointing towards the number of installed sugar mills in both the states, the UP minister said that as compared to 246 installed sugar mills in Maharashtra, there are 157 installed sugar mills in UP.