State-owned sugar mills are once again operating at a loss, poised to lose another Tk2 billion this year. This is yet another drain on the Bangladeshi taxpayer which needs to close.
For many years, these inefficient state-run sugar mills have been incurring losses of hundreds of crores. Productions costs are soaring, and the slump of the price of sugar in the world market has enabled private sugar producers to sell their sugar for cheaper.
The state should not subsidise these loss-making businesses. There is no excuse to continue funding these businesses at a massive cost to the nation, especially if there are cheaper alternatives such as imported sugar. Furthermore, the opportunity cost of bankrolling these industries is that farmers could be growing something better.
All of this supports the basic argument that the government should no longer be supporting the 15 or state-owned loss-making sugar mills, which have been fighting a failing battle against the competitive prices of the free market.
Furthermore, these state-owned mills, due to insufficient storage capacity, are tremendously wasteful. A large volume of unsold molasses gets wasted every year because the surplus cannot be sold locally or internationally.
Expensive and wasteful state-owned industries like the sugar mills are costing the country and the taxpayer dearly. It is time to stop this waste.
Source: Dhaka Tribune
The Government should demolish these sugar mills and sell the lands to different industry owners in the private sector. If importing is less cost effective, then why hang onto these dilapidated factories which are incurring losses, year after year? That doesn’t make any sense. Lets use some common sense and utilize these properties into something that should be beneficial to the country’s economy. Thank You.