2016 Beet Price June 30, 2015 12:00 am The sugar beet price for the 2016 crop will be £20.30 per tonne. This announcement comes following an agreement between British Sugar and the NFU for next year’s crop (the 2016/17 campaign). The price applies to contract tonnage (CTE) and industrial ‘ICE’ beet. The price for surplus beet (still widely referred to as ‘C beet’) has not yet been set; there will be a further announcement later in the year. This price compares with £24 per tonne for the current crop and £31.67 in 2014. The transport allowance for 2016/17 will be calculated from the Industry Haulage Scheme. In terms of tonnage, there will be no compulsory quota cut next year (for the current year there was a 9% reduction). However, growers have the choice of contracting for anywhere between 0% and 100% of their standard CTE and ICE tonnages for 2016. They will retain the right to grow the usual amount for the following 2017 crop (2017/18 campaign). Whatever tonnage is contracted, there are performance rules – at least 95% of the contract tonnage must be delivered, averaged over the two 2015/16 and 2016/17 campaigns. It was widely expected that the price would drop compared to last year, but also that efforts would be made to keep a ‘2’ in front of it. This is what has happened. There is still an oversupply of sugar in Europe and around the world, and prices are currently low. British Sugar is holding high stocks and is understandably not keen to pay high prices for large amounts of beet. It will be interesting to see what volumes are grown at the price offered. It is likely that many growers will continue with the crop, especially given the low profitability of alternative cropping.
