The sugar industry has made a record payment of Rs 2.14 lakh crore to sugarcane farmers in the last six years.
The sugar industry is dominated by the private sector with 119 mills followed by the cooperative sector and three mills of the public sector.
The Yogi Adityanath government has also opened two new mills, reopened four closed ones and expanded the crushing capacity of 30 mills during the last six years.
Soon after taking over as the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh in March 2017, Yogi Adityanath chalked out a strategy, according top priority to the interests of sugarcane farmers and focusing on sugarcane crushing, production and processing.
The government first revived the closed sugar mills in the state and focused on clearing the outstanding payments to the farmers. The government’s consistent efforts helped the sugar mills run more efficiently, increasing the amount of sugar produced.
It is worth mentioning here that owing to the state government’s policies, sugarcane productivity in the state increased from 72.38 metric tons per hectare in 2016-17 to 82.31 metric tons per hectare in 2022. The production of sugarcane has increased by 9.93 metric tons per hectare in the last six years. With this, sugarcane farmers are getting an additional profit of Rs 34,656 at the rate of Rs 349 per quintal per hectare.
In the 2022-23 crushing season, over 120 sugar mills are operating today in Uttar Pradesh. In the year 2021-22, 1,016.26 lakh tons of sugarcane was crushed by the sugar mills from which 101.98 lakh tons of sugar was produced. In 2022-23, so far 1,098.31 lakh tons of sugarcane has been crushed, producing 105.41 lakh tons of sugar.
In the last six years, a record 6,403 lakh tons of sugarcane was crushed by the sugar mills, producing a record 683.07 lakh metric ton of sugar. Not only this, two new sugar mills were established in the state and the capacity of 30 sugar mills was expanded with the restarting of four sugar mills, which created a total additional crushing capacity of 78,900 TCD in sugar mills.
For promoting the khandsari units, the state government implemented an online khandsari licensing system in UP after making amendments in the Khandsari Policy. As a result, 284 new khandsari units were established in UP, leading to direct and indirect employment to 31,690 people.
The state government has also made a record in the production of ethanol in the country. The production of ethanol in Uttar Pradesh increased from 42.07 crore litre in the year 2016-17 to 160 crore litre in 2022-23.
The Sugarcane department linked women with employment to make them self-reliant. The department engaged rural women in sugarcane seed production and distribution during the COVID-19 pandemic. At present, 3,196 women self-help groups are active with 60,000 rural women entrepreneurs earning their livelihood by producing sugarcane saplings. So far, 38 crore sugarcane saplings/seedlings have been produced by women self-help groups, which have earned Rs 102 crore from its distribution. Women self-help groups have played a leading role in adding more varieties of sugarcane and its seeds over the years.