Ministry of Agriculture & Fisheries

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Harvesting operations have resumed at the Frome Sugar Factory in Westmoreland, following the suspension of reaping earlier this month because of bad weather conditions.

Persistent rainfall during the December to January period led to the suspension of harvesting operations at Frome for about 10 days, to allow the fields to dry out, so as to improve the sucrose content of the cane.

General Manager of the Sugar Divestment Enterprise (SDE), John Gayle, told JIS News that harvesting and milling resumed earlier this week, with operations at the factory back in full force since then.

He told JIS News that the tons cane/tons sugar (tc/ts) ratio has improved tremendously and is now at an acceptable standard.

"In fact, the report I have for this morning is that the tc/ts, which is that measure of cane quality, is now at 11.3. When we stopped, we were looking at high 13 up to even 14," he informed.

"For this morning, relative to when we stopped, we are now using almost three tons of cane less to make a ton of sugar," he added.

In the meantime, Mr. Gayle has assured that the production target of the Frome Factory was not affected by the temporary closure, noting that the schedule for the shipment of sugar is on target.

"Actually, our first shipment of sugar out as part of our contract with (Italian company) Eridana, we are planning to have that boat sailing from (Ocho Rios Pier) around the 6th or 7th of February with around 20,000 to 21,000 tons of sugar," he told JIS News.

The 2009/2010 sugar crop started at the Frome Sugar Factory on December 4, 2009 and is expected to run until the middle of May 2010. At the time of the suspension approximately 5,700 tons of sugar had been produced at the factory from the present crop.

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