Sugar firms suffer loss

Sugar firms suffer loss

JAKARTA (Antara): Most of the 55 sugar factories located in Java, suffered losses lately, the chief director of the state- owned PT Perkebunan Nusantara IX, Bambang Sardjono, said Thursday.

He said that the losses were not caused by to old age of the factories concerned which are mostly remnants of the Dutch colonial era, but more due to the limited area of land for sugar cane cultivation in Java.

Despite their old age, these sugar factories have equipments which are still in good condition.

Regular renovations annually conducted on the factories' machineries have kept the factories' milling capacity on par, but the fast dwindling area of land for sugar cane cultivation has been the main cause of the production decline, Sardjono said.

During 108 days of milling in last year's milling season, the 13 sugar factories in Central Java which have milling capacities of 254,000 quintals of sugar canes per day, were only able to mill an average of 210,000 quintals per day.

In 1995/1996 Central Java had a sugar cane cultivated area of 43,000 hectares but it declined to 41,000 hectares in the following year.