January 14, 2016

White sugar surging into Myanmar, smuggled to China

LONDON/BEIJING - Strong flows of white sugar are moving from India and Thailand to Myanmar, a fast-growing destination, and much of that is believed to be smuggled into China, trade sources said.
They said a clampdown on raw sugar import licences by Chinese authorities, a disappointing start to the Chinese harvest due to adverse weather, and high import margins into China, have spurred the trade.

The strong Chinese demand has contributed to pushing up whites-over-raws premiums on the Intercontinental Exchange to in excess of $100 per ton this week, a very comfortable margin for refiners.

White sugar is also believed to be smuggled into China via Laos and Cambodia, trade sources said.

"Shipments from Thailand to Myanmar and Laos have been very heavy in the last couple of months," a Western analyst said. "That's another route into China." (Courtesy of Agweek)

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