We Are Not Part Of Plan To Cause Scarcity Of Sugar In Nigeria, BUA Foods Says
The management of BUA Foods Plc has officially taken a stand on move by two major industry players to suspend sales of sugar in the country in a bid to create artificial scarcity.
In a statement made available on Sunday February 13, 2022, the recently listed consolidated enterprise on the Nigeria Exchange (NGX) Limited clearly stated it is not in any way associated with the planned “suspension of sugar sales nor increase prices between now and Ramadan (a peak demand period for sugar) as others have done.”
Titled “RE: SUSPENSION OF SUGAR SALES” the statement where BUA Foods expressly insisted “that any customer of ours found selling sugar higher than the market price or withholding sugar to create scarcity, will be immediately delisted as our dealer” reads…
We have been inundated with calls from our customers that Dangote Sugar and Flour Mülls have both suspended sales of Sugar, seeking to know if BLA will follow suit. We would like to reassure our customers that BUA is not joining the suspension of sales of sugar.
Whilst the suspension of sales of Sugar by Flour Mils may be understandable because their 2022 row sugar allocation has been declined by the government due to compliancensurs we do not understand why Dangote has joined. In our opinion, this stoppage may be intended to create scarcity, force the prices to artificially goas, profiteer even more, and blackmell the government to review the denial of allocation to Flour Mills due to compliance issues
We believe that government should not be blackmailed into rescinding a compliance-based decision and the process should be allowed to follow its due and proper curse. In any event, we would like to iterate that BUIA does not intend to join this suspension of sugar sales nor increase prices between now and Ramadan (a peal demand period for Sugar) as the others have done
BUA remains committed to ensuring there is no price hike during this period.
For further context and clarity, BUA has enough capacity between its Lagos Sugar Refinery and Port Harcourt Sugar Refinery with a combined capacity of 1.5million metric tonnes to meet 90% of the local demand in Nigeria need be BUA is ready to stop all sugar exports and channel that to meet local demand. BUA has always made it clear that our Port Harcourt sugar operation is always ready to supplement sugar supply if there is scarcity, as we have done in the past in similar situations in 2020 and 2021. We therefore want to reassure our customers that there is nothing to fear as between our Lagos Sugar Refinery and the Port Harcourt Sugar Refinery, we have enough sugar to take care of local demand regardless of the actions of the
We enjon our customers and dealers to ensure there is no panic-buying and not to withhold stock as we have enough sugar to sustain the market between now and after Ramadan which starts in the next weeks BUA remains committed to ensuring the price of sugar is not excreased during this holy period and we will continue to sell at the same price. Our dealers are therefore enjoined to continue to pay the same price for sugar from us as they have always done
We also wish to advise that any customer of ours found selling sugar higher than the market price or withholding sugar to create scarcity, will be immediately delisted as our dealer.
