Brazil’s 2019/20 center-south sugarcane crush campaign will end this month and the 2020/21 campaign will begin in April. For the current campaign, total crush bested last year’s pace at 582.9 MMT of cane through mid-March, up 3 percent YOY, per UNICA.

With the sugar share down a point YOY at 34.4 percent of cane crush, total center-south sugar production stood at 2.53 MMT, up just 0.6 percent YOY.

Ethanol production, meanwhile, was up 7.3 percent YOY at 32.80 billion liters.

If Brazilian national and state governments move towards more aggressive measures to contain the spread of COVID-19, pressure would be expected on fuel demand, directly affecting ethanol uptake. Balancing this, of course, are weaker crude oil prices on one side and a weakening Brazilian real on the other side.

In the first half of March, the sugar share was just 13.0 percent and the ethanol share 83.0 percent, leading to total ethanol production of 244 million liters, up 72 percent from the first half of March 2019. Sugar output was just 41,000 MT.

Brazil center-south cumulative sugarcane crush


Source: UNICA, McKeany-Flavell
Posted by: Information Services
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