Sweetener Users Association Continues Push for Increase in Sugar TRQs
The Agriculture Department should move quickly to increase the tariff-rate quotas (TRQs) for raw and refine sugar in addition to the reallocation of existing TRQs, the Sweetener Users Association (SUA) said in a letter to the USDA. The letter follows a recent similar request from the SUA to the USDA. New World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates projections highlight the needs for a major TRQ increase. According to the letter, ending stocks are now projected at just 6.8% of total use, well under half of a normal level even under the most conservative assumptions.
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At this point in the season, one must expect that any TRQ will include around a 10% shortfall, so amounts need to be adjusted for this reality, said the SUA letter. Using USDA's estimate of total consumption, attaining a stocks-to-use target of 14.5% would require a total TRQ increase of 982,000 short tons, raw value (STRV), while attaining 15.5% (the amount that SUA has consistently advocated) would require the TRQ to rise by 1,110,000 STRV. Of the total TRQ increase, a substantial portion should be refined sugar, said SUA.
(See ITT's Online Archives 12040219 for summary of the previous letter from the Sweetener Users Association regarding sugar TRQs.)