World sugar and
SWEETENERS CONFERENCE
1996 - IDENTIFYING
CHALLENGES AND
OPPORTUNITIES
12
conference
Bangkok was the venue for third dedicated sector conference
sponsored by the bank, this time on the global sugar and
sweeteners industry. Over 250 participants and 17 speakers from all
sectors of the industry worldwide responded to this opportunity to
exchange information, ideas and insights in two days of intense
discussion. What's NewS provides a summary.
Soviet Union and India. 'China alone can
account for 12 percent of world imports
one year, and 5 percent of world exports in
the next,' he concluded. 'Such shifts make
sugar prices highly vulnerahle.'
EFFICIËNT ADVANTAGE
Protectionism was also a hot issue, with
speakers such as Margaret Blamberg,
director of the US Domino Sugar
Corporation, describing the most recent US
Farm Bill as essentially a policy for
maintaining a protected market - in spite of
GA IT agreements on freer trade. Blamberg
agreed with Visser that in the long term
protection results in a weak industry. The
general consensus was that protectionism,
specifically in the US and EU, leads to high
and thus uncompetitive cost-prices. 'Once
full liberalization takes place,' Visser noted,
'and given the significant differences
between present cost-price and anticipated
world market prices, efficiënt producers,
such as Brazil and Australia, will have a
distinct advantage.'
MARKET SHIFTS
The current protectionist situation was only
one area of focus. The conference was
sectioned into five parts covering
competitiveness in the sweeteners industry,
international trends in consumption,
critical perspectives for both sectors, as well
as the impact of government policies and
market outlook in Asia, Brazil and Cuba.
Asia has already replaced Europe as key
sugar consumer. Estimates indicate
consumption growth in the whole of Asia
at an average of 4 percent annually, while
European demand has stabilized and even
declined slightly. The shift in market, from
rich, price-intensive countries to lower
Preparing to meet the press - Henk Visser,
Helmut Ahlfeld and Hans Hannaart.
The choice of location for this year's
conference reflects Asia's position as main
growth market for both sugar and
sweeteners. According to Helmut Ahlfeld
of FO Light, the sector's premier provider
of commodity market information which
co-organized the conference with Agra
Europe, there was a further reason.
'Thailand is fast emerging as a sector
superpower,' he says, 'the country already
ranks third in raw sugar exports behind
Australia and Brazil. So we brought the
conference to one of the dominant centres
of this market.'
SECTOR SWINGS
Keynote speaker was the bank's Henk
Visser who opened the conference with a
comprehensive paper designed to initiate
further discussion on challenges and
opportunities in the industry. He pointed
out the structural instability confronting
the sugar sector, not least as a result of
massive swings in major producing
countries, such as China, Brazil, the former
income, price responsive markets has
effectively placed a ceiling on world sugar
prices.
SWEETENER CHALLENGE
Growth in developing countries is, in part,
generated by increasing demand for soft
drinks, ice-cream and confectionery. This
also has serious implications for the sugar
industry as essentially it faces a challenge
from within. The choice between sugar or
sweeteners is a burning issue for the food
industry. The advent of high-quality starch
and intensive sweeteners has made sugar
more vulnerahle to substitution than ever
before, particularly in protected markets
with high domestic sugar prices, which are
in fact borne by consumers. 1'rofessor A.
Vlitos, former director-general of the World
WORLD SUGAR
SWEETENERS
CONFERENCE IN
BANGKOK
De suiker en zoetstoffenindustrie en
-experts waren ruim vertegenwoordigd op
de derde door de Rabobank georgani
seerde Agri conferentie. De meer dan 250
aanwezige vertegenwoordigers van
bedrijven en 17 sprekers hadden de gele
genheid hun kennis en ideeën uit te
wisselen. Ook was de conferentie een goede
gelegenheid om onze expertise op dit
gebied voor het voetlicht te brengen. Voor
een aantal deelnemers was het een open
baring om te zien hoeveel studies van de
Rabobank al verschenen zijn. Met enthou
siasme nam men de aanwezige brochures
mee. De interviews met een van de auteurs
van de suikerstudie door BBC World Service
en de Australische radio geven aan dat ook
buiten de Agri-sector belangstelling bestaat
voor onze kennis.
