THE Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) has temporarily suspended molasses importation and will review its policies that govern it to find a balance that will be beneficial to local producers and users.
SRA Administrator Pablo Luis Azcona, in a statement issued on Thursday, October 2, 2025, said that they would like to take a closer look at the “discrepancy” in the volume of locally produced molasses used versus the amount of alcohol production.
In Molasses Order No. 1 dated September 30, 2025, the Sugar Board noted that molasses importation in the last crop year increased by 28 percent compared to previous years, totaling 853,285 metric tons.
This was despite a 20.5 percent increase in domestic production, which reached 1.176 million metric tons, or more than 200,000 metric tons higher than the previous crop year. As a result, the molasses millsite stock balance stood at 303,961 metric tons as of the end of August.
The call for a moratorium on molasses importation was issued by sugar stakeholders after a noticeable decrease in the withdrawal of local molasses from mills, plus a decrease in the price of domestic molasses, averaging P12,000 per metric ton which is about 30 percent lower than in the previous crop year when the price was averaging at P18,000 per metric ton.
The bulk of molasses domestic production is used by ethanol producers, which allows oil companies to subscribe to the biofuel law that mandates a blend of locally produced ethanol in the gasoline.
“We also need to see why the local molasses purchased from the farmers still remain unwithdrawn and unused. Hence, there is no need to import,” Azcona said.
He said it is imperative that they know where these ethanol and alcohol producers are sourcing their molasses from.
“For the ethanol producers, we hope that their feedstock is really local as the biofuel law states, and for the alcohol producers, that they consume the local produce first, which is actually of higher quality, prior to resorting to lower quality imported molasses.” Azcona added.
Moreover, Azcona said they were surprised that in the entire existence of the SRA, there have been no concrete policies or guidelines on molasses importation and allocation to ensure that local farmers’ produce is consumed first, and that imports serve only as a temporary stopgap measure in case of a shortage of locally produced molasses.
He said they are assuring farmers and millers that a performance-based policy on molasses import allocation will be crafted, allowing for a calibrated, fair, and objective process for importation.
He added that the moratorium will last until the end of this year and may be extended or lifted by the SRA depending on the stock balance.
At present, Azcona said the SRA will no longer process clearances for the release of imported molasses.
However, he clarified that applications filed with the SRA before the issuance of Molasses Order No. 1, or shipments of imported molasses already in transit, will not be covered by the moratorium. (MAP)