Ships waiting to load sugar at Brazil’s main ports declined by more than half from a year earlier as the nation harvests the smallest crop in four years, Cosan SA Industria & Comercio’s logistics arm said.
The number of vessels waiting to load at six sugar ports, including the Port of Santos, Brazil’s largest, fell to 36 yesterday from 98 a year earlier, research firm SA Commodities said. Vessels were waiting to load 1.12 million metric tons of the sweetener, down from 2.81 million tons a year ago.
Cane growers in Brazil’s Center South, the world’s largest producing region, will reap the smallest crop in four years after plants were hurt by dryness and frost, Pedro Mizutani, executive vice president of the milling business for a venture between Royal Dutch Shell Plc and Cosan, said Sept. 5. Last year, shipments from Brazil were disrupted by excessive rain.
“The situation is much, much calmer this year,” said Julio Fontana Neto, chief executive officer for Cosan’s Rumo Logistica SA unit, owner of the world’s largest sugar port terminal. “It’s a relief after last year’s nightmare,” he said yesterday in a telephone interview from Sao Paulo.
Brazil is the world’s largest producer and exporter of the sweetener. Latin America’s largest economy accounts for about 54 percent of global exports. The country had a record 135 ships waiting to load sugar in August 2010.
Sugar Price Rise
Raw sugar for March delivery fell 1.87 cent, or 6.6 percent, to close at 26.31 cents a pound on ICE Futures U.S. in New York. Prices gained 12 percent in the past year.
“The lineup has fallen because sugar is at such high levels, that is has caused demand to diminish,” Jeff Bauml, a senior vice president at R.J. O’Brien & Associates, a broker in New York, said in a telephone interview.
Rumo is controlled by Cosan, which has a 75 percent stake. Private equity fund TPG Capital, based in Fort Worth, Texas, and Gavea Investimentos Ltda, the private equity firm founded by former Brazilian Central Bank President Arminio Fraga, each own 12.5 percent.
To contact the reporter on this story: Lucia Kassai in Sao Paulo at lkassai@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dale Crofts at dcrofts@bloomberg.net
