WASHINGTON — The US Department of Agriculture’s Commodity Credit Corp. on Sept. 24 announced the sugar beet and sugarcane allotments, processor marketing allocations and marketing assistance loan rates for fiscal 2021 — the 2020-21 sugar marketing year.
The initial 2020-21 overall sugar marketing allotment was established at 10,327,500 tons, raw value, which is equal to 85% of estimated deliveries for domestic human consumption of 12,150,000 tons as forecast in the Sept. 11 World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates report, as required by statute. The beet sugar allotment was set at 5,612,996 tons (54.35% of the total) and the cane sugar allotment at 4,714,504 tons (45.65%). The CCC also is required to allot 325,000 tons of the cane allotment to the “offshore” states of Hawaii and Puerto Rico, both of which have permanently exited sugarcane production. That amount instead was allotted to the three mainland producing states of Florida, Louisiana and Texas.
The 2020-21 allocations are as follows for beet sugar: Amalgamated Sugar Co., 1,201,785 tons; American Crystal Sugar Co., 2,064,243 tons; Michigan Sugar Co., 579,685 tons; Minn-Dak Farmers Co-op., 389,817 tons; So. Minn Beet Sugar Co-op, 757,576 tons; Western Sugar Co., 572,891 tons; and Wyoming Sugar Company, LLC, 46,999 tons.
Allocations for cane sugar in Florida are Florida Crystals, 1,043,289 tons; Growers Co-op of FL, 455,818 tons; and US Sugar Corp., 1,034,831 tons. Allocations for Louisiana are Louisiana Sugar Cane Products, Inc., 1,360,893 tons, and M.A. Patout & Sons, 599,393 tons. In Texas the allocation is 220,279 tons to Rio Grande Valley.
Marketing assistance loan rates were established in the 2018 farm bill at a national average of 19.75¢ per lb for raw cane sugar and 25.38¢ a lb for refined beet sugar with rates adjusted regionally to reflect marketing cost differentials, which are unchanged from last year. Regionally, those rates are 26.32¢ a lb in Michigan and Ohio, 24.98¢ in Minnesota and the eastern half of North Dakota, 26.09¢ in the northeastern quarter of Colorado, Nebraska and the southeastern quarter of Wyoming, 25.26¢ in Montana, the northwestern quarter of Wyoming and the western half of North Dakota, 25.53¢ in Idaho, Oregon and Washington, and 26.75¢ in California.
Loan rates for raw cane sugar are 18.96¢ a lb in Florida, 20.55¢ in Louisiana and 20.24¢ in Texas.
Sugarcane processors also are required to pay growers for their share of production from molasses and sugar at minimum $27.86 per net ton in Florida, $30.51 per gross ton in Louisiana and $27.84 per gross ton in Texas.