Beijing, May 26 - Sugar planting areas in Guangxi, China's largest sugar producing region, may fall 10 percent in the 2009/2010 crushing season, a report on the Guangxi Sugar Wholesale Market website said.
Guangxi, which produces about 60 percent of China's total sugar output, is estimated to have sowed 967,000 hectares of sugar this year, compared to 1.08 million hectares in the 2008/2009 crushing season.
Guangxi has produced 7.63 million tonnes of sugar in the 2008/2009 crushing season, down 19 percent from a year earlier.
China's total sugar output slipped to 12.34 million tonnes this year, down 16.6 percent from the record level of 14.80 million tonnes seen last year.
Most Chinese sugar mills complete crushing canes in April.
The planted acerage does not directly relate to the sugar output as weather plays an important role in the growing conditions of the crop.