The Moroccan sugar group "COSUMAR" achieved a USD 356 million turnover in 2005, a 3% increase compared to 2004 and a net result estimated at USD 27 million.
The increase was due to the group's purchase last August of four sugar companies and improvement of its refining plants' treatment capacity, said COSUMAR director general, Mohamed Fikrat, during a press briefing held Tuesday in Casablanca.
Last August, the government ceded all its shares in the capital of four sugar companies to the Moroccan sugar group COSUMAR for USD 152 million. This finished the total privatisation of the sugar industry in Morocco, and the completion of a process that had lasted since 1990.
The group is planning to invest USD 156 million in the coming six years. It stakes on an increase of 25% in the cultivated areas and of 40% in farmers' income in the next decade.
In 2005, the national sugar market absorbed over one million tons, i.e. a 1.7% increase compared to 2004, which corresponds to an annual average rate consumption of 35kg per inhabitant.
Granulated sugar represents 49.5% of the national sugar market, sugar loaf 37.9% and lump and ingot sugar 12.5%.
According to COSUMAR statistics, close to 46% of the national sugar production depends on local plants'output, while 50% on imported raw sugar.
At the social level, some 80,000 people live on the sugar industry in Morocco, on an area covering 90,000ha.
Created in 1929, the COSUMAR refines raw sugar under various forms in 14 refining plants with a 14,000 tons per day capacity.
© Morocco Times 2006
