The government on Friday allocated 19.63 lakh tonnes of sugar for sale in the open market as well as via ration shops for the month of May, marginally higher than the current month.
The food ministry "has decided to make available 19.63 lakh tonne of sugar (levy sugar — 2.13 lakh tonne and non-levy sugar – 17.50 lakh tonne) for the month of May," an official statement said.
Levy sugar is meant for ration shops while non-levy sugar is sold in the open market. The ministry had allocated 19.07 lakh tonnes of sugar for the current month.
"This quantity of 19.63 lakh tonne is sufficient to meet the internal demand of sugar for the month of May," the statement said, adding that mills need to sell the entire quantity by May 31.
The food ministry also extended the deadline for sale of April quota till May 15.
Out of 17.50 lakh tonnes of non-levy sugar, food ministry said that 15.45 lakh tonnes would be normal quota, while 0.05 lakh tonnes would be refined sugar processed from imported raw sugar and 2 lakh tonnes as carryover from March.
India's sugar production is estimated to rise to 24.5 million tonnes in 2010-11 (October-September) as against 18.8 million tonnes in the previous year. The domestic demand is pegged at 22 million tonnes.
With projection of higher output, the government recently allowed export of five lakh tonnes of sugar under Open General License (OGL).