COVID-19 has turned the sugar mills of Uttar Pradesh into exporter of sanitisers after they produced around 36 lakh litre of sanitiser of which around 40 per cent has been exported to other states.
UP, after meeting its requirements, has started export of the sanitisers, the most sought after commodity to fight the spread of the coronavirus.
Principal Secretary (Excise) Sanjay Bhoosreddy said here on Saturday that so far the distilleries in the state had produced 36 lakh litres of sanitiser. He said of this 14.50 lakh litres had so far been exported to Delhi, Maharashtra, Haryana, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Assam, Odisha, Rajasthan, Meghalaya, Kerala, Jharkhand, Chandigarh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Jammu and Kashmir, Telangana, West Bengal, Nagaland and Dadar and Haveli.
UP has ramped up the collective manufacturing capacity of sanitisers to about 2 lakh litres per day.  The capacity of manufacturing sanitisers which was 40,000 litres in March was increased to cater to the increased demand for hand sanitiser in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.  Besides the chemical industrial units, many sugar factories have set up plants for the manufacture of the sanitisers.
At  present, UP has 85 units engaged in commercial production of hand sanitiser — 46 of these are dedicated sanitiser plants, 27 sugar mills, 12 standalone distilleries and eight independent entities. Earlier, there were only 5-6 permanent hand sanitiser units in the state and the number significantly increased in March/April. The new units have come up to cater to the growing demand for hand sanitiser amid  the crisis caused by the COVID-19, which has prompted the Central and state governments to urge even the private sector to come forward.
While the 2019-20 sugarcane crushing season is gradually tapering in the state, the mills, currently engaged in sanitiser production, are likely to continue manufacturing even after they conclude crushing operations. They would need only ethanol/alcohol, which they already have in abundance. So far, 32 of the 119 sugar mills in UP have closed down for the season, with cane in their respective areas getting exhausted.
The mills that have set up hand sanitiser facilities pertain to major private sugar companies like Balrampur Chini, Birla, Dalmia, Dhampur, Uttam, etc. The government had earlier expedited the processes to issue the necessary licences and approvals in this regard.

While some sugar companies are manufacturing bulk quantities of hand sanitiser themselves or supplying to other firms for bottling and marketing, a few others have signed contracts to supply ethanol/ethyl alcohol/extra neutral alcohol (ENA) to external plants. Sanitisers are generally manufactured with isopropyl alcohol (IPA), but these have also been found to be effective when made from sugar by-products ethanol/ethyl alcohol/ENA.