PROVE CLAIMS
Yulo: Why are planters being blamed for high sugar prices?
SUGAR Regulatory Board Member Emilio Yulo III yesterday challenged critics of the sugar industry to substantiate their claims that sugar producers must be blamed for the continued high prices of retail sugar.
At a forum called “Tapatan sa Aristocrat” in The Aristocrat restaurant in Manila, Yulo who represented both SRA and sugar farmers lamented that industrial users are pointing fingers at sugar producers as the cause of high sugar price, particularly in Metro Manila where it is being retailed at more than P60 per kilo.
For the past three weeks, sugar prices in Negros have gone down to about P1,400 millgate price yet retail prices have not done so, which means, someone, other than the sugar farmers, are profiting greatly from the high prices, Yulo said.
He added that SRA has negotiated with Robinson’s Mall, as among those in the past who heeded the call of the industry, to sell sugar at an equitable price of P50 per kilo and this will be implemented nationwide.
Yulo also said that sugar producers have started establishing their
own market depot to show that it remains profitable to sell sugar at the P50 level price thus farmers should not be blamed for the prevailing high prices in metro cities.
Industrial users have been using high prices in Metro Manila as their basis to urge the government to accede to their demands to allow them direct importation, to which Yulo said is “preposterous.”/pr