Kenya has announced new prices for sugarcane at Sh4, 040 per tonne that would be effective from April 1, 2020.
Cabinet secretary Peter Munya announced the new rates stating that the sugar mills that fail to comply with the rules will face a fine of not less than Sh500, 000 or jail for one year.
The announcements were made after the interim sugarcane pricing committee reviewed the prices that were stagnant at Sh3, 700 since 2018.
The sugar deficit will be met by importing sweetener from the Comesa region, said CS.
Kenya imported brown sugar from COMESA and rest from the other parts of the world. COMESA countries supplied 343,087 tones which is 78 per cent of the total imports in this period. All brown sugar originated from the COMESA region while the rest was imported from the rest of the world.
