Indian Sugar Industry

Date: 14-02-09

PROJECT

ON

Sugar Industry

Submitted By

Saurabh Bhatia

BBA 1st Year

Introduction

Domestic scenario

Indian sugar industry, second largest agro-based processing industry after the Cotton textiles industry in country has a lion's share in accelerating industrialization process and bringing socio-economic changes in under developed rural areas. Sugar industry covers around 7.5% of total rural population and provides employment to 5 lakh rural people. About 4.5 crore farmers are engaged in sugarcane cultivation in India. Sugar mills (cooperative, private, and public) have been instrumental in initiating a number of entrepreneurial activities in rural India.

International scenario

India is the fourth major sugar producing country in the world, the first three being Russia, Brazil and Cuba. Sugar industry occupies an important place among organised industries in India. Sugar industry, one of the major agro-based industrial in India, has been instrumental in resource mobilization, employment generation, income generation and creating social infrastructure in rural areas. Indeed, sugar industry has facilitated and accelerated pace of rural industrialization. At present, there are 553 registered sugar factories having capital investment of Rs. 50,000 crores and annual production capacity of 180 lakh metric tonnes (ISMA Report, 2004). The annual turnover of industry is to the tune of Rs. 25,000 crores. The central and state governments receive annually Rs. 2500 crore as excise duty, purchase tax, and cess. More than 4.50 core farmers are engaged in sugarcane cultivation and about 5 lakh rural people have got direct employment in the industry. Sugar industry has brought socioeconomic changes in rural India by way of facilitating entrepreneurial activities such as dairies, poultries, fruits and vegetable processing, and providing educational, health and credit facilities.

SUGAR PRODUCTION IN ANCIENT PERIOD IN INDIA

Sugarcane has been one of the major crops of India since times immemorial. Iksu, The term of sugarcane, is found in the Atharvaveda1, Vajasaneyii, Maitrayani3 and Taittriya, Samhitas and the subsequent Sutras. The Aryans knew the plant from a very early time and the fact that sugarcane is indigenous to India is beyond dispute. The word Iksu has no parallel in any other Indo-Aryan language, which suggests that the Indo-Aryans only came to know about the plant only after entering India. This is, supported by the fact that little evidence of sugar or sugarcane is found in any archaeological site of the prehistoric or early historical period; however, this negative evidence is no proof that it was unknown. The cultivation of sugarcane caught the attention of the Greek visitors to India so something singular and strange. They speak of it as 'reeds that make honey without the agency of bees. This phenomenon of sweet juice produced from reeds was ingeniously explained by Megasthenes. According to him, the sweet juice was due to the water which the cane absorbed from the soil being so warmed by the sun's heat that the plant was virtually cooked as it grew.

In addition, Indian literature provides enough evidence of availability of Sugarcane in the ancient period. Sugarcane plant and its juice find mention in the medicinal works of Caraka and Susruta. In the Jatakas, there is a reference to pressing of sugarcane in machines. The occupation of cane pressing and the machine used in the process are specifically mentioned. The sugarcane press and allied machines were known by the name of mahajanta (mahayantra or kolluka) (compare with vernacular word kolhu).

The Vyavahara Bhasya refers to sheds where such pressing machines were installed. India early evolved the technique of manufacturing sugar. The Arthasastra includes the manufacture of sugar from cane juice in a list of works called Simbanika. Caraka, in his medicinal work states that ksudra guda is formed by evaporating the juice of sugarcane down to a quarter, a third or half of the original volume. Guda is a purified product and contain few impurities. Even more refined are matsyandika, khanda and sarkara, each of which is purer than the preceding one. Caraka notes the medicinal properties of these four types, which are in fact four stages in the process of manufacturing