The sugarcane crush in Brazil's Parana state in the second half of November totaled 555,142 mt, a 65.5% drop from the first half of the month and a 66% drop from the year-ago period, a Bioenergy Producers Association of Parana, or Alcopar, official said Tuesday.
"Unfortunately the crushing was much lower than expected as a consequence of the wettest November for the last 34 years," the director-president of Alcopar, Miguel Tranin, said. "Some units did not work even one day in November and others only three-four days," he said.
The first half of November was also wet and the amount of cane crushed was 31% down year on year to 1.6 million mt, the data showed. It was the second time this year that rain greatly hampered the Parana crushing. July saw the worst crush of the year, at 263,269 mt, down 90% year on year, as it rained almost the entire first two weeks.
Because of the rain in the second half of November, the ATR -- or total recoverable sugar per ton of cane -- was down 14.49 kg/mt from same period a year ago at 124.8 kg/mt, and 6.44 kg lower than H1 November.
Sugar production in H2 November reached 27,827 mt, down 73% compared to a year ago, while ethanol production amounted to 23.4 million liters, down 61% year on year.
From April's start of the harvest season through end-November, the total sugarcane crushed dropped 9% from same period last year to 36.9 million mt. "The expectation was to have reached 40 million to 41 million tons by end-November, but we lost to rain over 20 working days," Tranin said.
Total sugar production through end-November was down 7% year on year at 2.57 million mt, while total ethanol production this season amounted to 1.37 billion liters, down 9% from last season. Of that total, 848.2 million liters were hydrous ethanol -- down 16% on the year -- and the balance of 521.6 million liters was anhydrous, up 4%.
The percentage of cane diverted to ethanol production was the same as last season at 53%, with the balance diverted to ethanol production. The accumulated ATR this season reached 136.77 kg/mt, slightly up from 135.26 kg a year ago.
Early this season, Alcopar estimated that total cane crushed in the 2015-16 season should reach 43.08 million mt, down 5% from previous season. However, it is still uncertain how much it could drop this season due to rain.
It is unclear when mills will cease the operations for the season.
"Some have contracts to fulfill and will continue to produce even in such adverse situation, and then until January," Tranin said. "There is also the need for cash flow because right now ethanol has good prices," he added. "But we will certainly have an early start next harvest. On the one hand we are losing working days. On the other hand there is a great vegetative development of the cane, which possibly will bring more yield and productivity in the next crop year."
