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Ethanol plants to be set up in all cooperative sugarmills in Haryana: Minister
Decision was taken by the Haryana government to help improve financial health of sugarmills and clear payments of farmers on time
: The Haryana government has decided to set up ethanol plants in all the cooperative sugarmills to improve their financial condition and help clear payments of farmers on time, cooperative minister Banwari Lal said on Tuesday, as crushing operations began in most of the mills across the state.
The minister made the comments while inaugurating the crushing operations at Karnal, Shahbad, Panipat and Kaithal cooperative sugarmills.
Since the ethanol is in good demand, it will help to improve the financial health of the sugarmills as the prices of sugar keep fluctuating, the minister said.
He said that the government has decided to set up ethanol plants in all the cooperative sugarmills of the state as it will also help clear payments of farmers on time.
As per information, the ethanol plant to be set up at Karnal mill will have a capacity to generate 120 kilo-litre ethanol per day. A 60 kilo-litre per day ethanol plant has already been set up at the Shahbad cooperative sugarmill and the government has already approved setting up of ethanol plant of 90 kilo-litre per day at Panipat cooperative sugarmill.
The government was also considering to set up ethanol plants at all the cooperative sugarmills, including at Rohtak, Karnal, Sonepat, Jind, Kaithal, Meham, Gohana and Palwal.
Ethanol plant with a production capacity of 100 kilo-litre per day has been made operational at Yamunanagar’s Saraswati Sugarmill.
Even as the state government is yet to fix the Sugarcane Approved Price (SAP), the minister said that the payments of the farmers will be cleared as per the schedule.
According to top level officials of the agriculture department, the state government was planning to increase the sugarcane SAP by fixing it above ₹ 380 per quintal fixed by Punjab. The proposal to hike the SAP is pending with the chief minister’s office, it is learnt.
The minister said that that the mills have set a target of crushing about 56 lakh quintals of sugarcane this year, due to which about ₹ 202 crore will be given to farmers as payment of sugarcane.
