Hamburg, Jan 28 - Germany's sugar beet harvest is coming to an end in favourable weather and production of refined sugar will be about 100,000 tonnes above previous expectations, the head of German sugar industry association WVZ said.
Germany will produce about 3.7 million tonnes of refined sugar in the current 2008/09 season, above previous forecasts of around 3.6 million tonnes, WVZ Chief Executive Dieter Langendorf told Reuters on Wednesday.
A fall was expected from the 3.82 million tonnes produced last season as German farmers have reduced beet plantings following European Union reforms of its heavily-supported sugar industry.
"The harvest went relatively well and we are satisfied because we were able to achieve good sugar and beet yields, although the final figures are not available yet," Langendorf said.
The last tests this month show sugar content of 18.04 percent in the final beets delivered to refineries, up from 17.43 percent last year, following favourable weather this winter.
"We had no serious problems with the weather this season and a series of frosts in January did not create difficulties," he said.
Four German sugar refineries have closed following EU sugar subsidy reforms that had increased the length of its refining season by two to three weeks. In the past final production figures have been available by mid-January.
The 3.7 million tonnes output would mean Germany will produce around one million tonnes of sugar above its EU refined sugar production quota of 2.7 million tonnes this season.
Under EU rules, such over-quota sugar cannot be sold as food in the bloc's tightly regulated sugar market.
"We are taking a relaxed view of this," Langendorf said. "We do not have the impression that we will not be able to market this volume."
"There is the possibility to sell for industrial sugar use and the possibility to export."
The main outlet for industrial sugar was likely to be bioethanol while the EU in August 2008 approved an export quota of 650,000 tonnes of sugar.
Competition for bioethanol sales will be tough because of falling prices for rival feedstock grain.
Germany's CropEnergies, one of Europe's largest bioethanol producers, said on Jan. 21 it was switching from sugar to wheat as a raw material because of falling grain prices. [ID:nLL736165]
"I am still confident we will make large sales for bioethanol production," he said.