The Commerce ministry’s decision to open up sugar exports to the European Union and the US under preferential quotas to non-State Trading Enterprises (STE) has attracted opposition from the sugar industry, which claims the move will only benefit “a few petty traders”.

India has an annual preferential quota for export of 10,000 tonnes of white sugar to the EU and 8,424 tonnes of raw sugar (equivalent to 8,100 tonnes of whites) to the US. These shipments are not subject to any import duties, which otherwise amount to 419 euro per tonne in the EU and $ 357 per tonne in the US. Being duty-free makes such preferential quota exports a profitable proposition.