Sugar is a controlled commodity in India. It is covered under the purview of the Essential Commodities Act, 1955. The government controls sugar capacity additions through industrial licensing, determines the price of the major input which sugarcane, decides the quantity that can be sold in the open market, fixes the prices of the levy quota sugar, etc.

There are six large sugar mills in the State. The sugar mills are located at:

• Aska in Ganjam District
• Baragarh
• Nayagarh
• Baramba in Cuttack District
• Deogaon in Bolangir
• Haripur in Dhenkana

Sugarcane Development in Orissa  

• Orissa is predominantly an agricultural state with rural population of around 85%
• 60% of the population earn their livelihood from agriculture or allied sectors
• State has 62 lakh hectares of cultivable land
• High land – 27 lakh hectare, Medium land – 19 lakh hectare, Lowland- 16 lakh hectare
• 10 Agro- climatic Zones
• 8 major soil groups
• Suitable agro-climate condition for sugarcane cultivation
• Presently 36,000 hectares of land is under sugar cane cultivation
• Basic infrastructure and irrigation are available for cane development
• Average yield is 69 MT/ha. (approx.)
• 6 sugar mills are in production with an annual capacity of 16.87 lakh MT

Opportunity

• Excise Policy: New excise policy of the state would help sugar factories for production of ethanol from molasses
• Sugar consumption & production gap: State's consumption is around 5 lakh tonnes per year against production of about 50,000 tonnes of sugar
• Farm Mechanization: Present movement for farm mehanization will reduce cost of cane production