| MEXICO CITY (Dow Jones)--Mexico's largest sugar groups are
still suffering low 2000-2001 output figures as a result of a
major industry strike last year, which caused severe delays to
the harvesting, according to sugar statistics Friday.
According to latest harvest figures by the government's
Agroindustry Sugar Committee, Mexico's largest sugar group,
Consorcio Azucarero Escorpion, is recording a drop of almost
100,000 metric tons in refined output through April 28 below
the year-ago figure, a major loss for a single group.
Sugar traders and industry analysts agree that the overall
loss from the strike five months ago will be bigger if
Mexico's largest sugar groups see their operations
significantly affected by the strike.
This would make recovery of large output numbers more
difficult toward the end of the physical harvest, which
usually continues to sometime in June, but depends on how
early seasonal rains start.
Local traders in Mexico have reported that some early rains
already started in Veracruz this week, which could hinder an
extension of the harvest period into June or July - as rural
country roads become impassable to workers and hamper the
transportation of cane to mills.
The following is a table listing the impact by the strike
on the harvesting and production through the 25th harvest week
that ended April 28 for Mexico's 12 biggest sugar groups,
according to statistics by the committee.
Harvested output is in raw cane. All figures are in metric
tons.
----------------------------------------------------------
Sugar Group Harvested Refined
2000/01 1999/00 2000/01 1999/00
-----------------------------------------------------------
AGA 1,647,070 1,772,590 172,710 179,831
BetaSanMiguel 3,175,447 3,346,725 349,796 368,672
Escorpion 6,847,697 7,585,722 776,513 869,833
GAM 3,379,328 3,695,327 361,978 388,428
Machado 3,742,878 3,730,135 429,899 435,665
Piasa 2,031,616 2,048,604 249,217 248,385
Saenz 2,174,302 2,224,351 228,650 256,671
Santos 2,685,600 2,933,666 304,714 326,687
Seoane 1,456,235 1,332,507 165,221 148,761
Sucarmex 3,203,520 3,297,297 360,491 374,352
Independent 1,420,203 1,400,362 164,178 163,159
---------------------------------------------------------
Total* 34,584,821 35,989,182 3,854,382 4,026,722
*Figure for total national output, but excludes figures
from some smaller sugar groups not listed in this table. |