The East African Community (EAC) Council of Ministers has approved the importation of 23,459 tonnes of industrial sugar under preferential duty terms for the next 12 months by five Kenyan manufacturing firms.

Excel Chemical Limited will import 9,000 tonnes of sugar under the agreement, which allows the commodity to be imported at a 10% duty rate, for use in the production of fruit juices, flavoured drinks, drinking chocolate, and jelly.

GlaxoSmithKline Limited has been granted permission to import 4,000 tonnes for the manufacture of medicines and health drinks, while Kevian Kenya Limited has been granted permission to import 6,000 tonnes for juice production.

Highlands Drinks Limited, which will import 4,000 tonnes of industrial sugar to make Highlands cordials, carbonated soft drinks, and ready-to-drink products, and Equatorial Nut Processors Limited, which will import 459 tonnes to make fortified blended flour, are two other companies covered by the agreement.

Kenya does not produce industrial sugar (white refined sugar), so imports fill the void.

Sector supervisor

Local companies currently produce ordinary table sugar, which increased by 15% between January and July of this year when compared to the same period last year, forcing the sector regulator to cut imports by nearly half last month.

According to data from the Sugar Directorate, the volume of the commodity produced reached 480,849 tonnes during the review period, up from 418,799 during the same period last year.

The increase caused the directorate to limit imports in July to 9,394 tonnes, down from a high of 17,200 tonnes the previous month, a 46% decrease.