Sugar industry making losses

China's sugar industry has entered a period of losses, Jia Zhiren, standing vice-chairman of China Sugar Association, said at a sugar industry summit, Xinhua News Agency reported over the weekend.

China's sugar industry has seen two years of losses, with a 3.1 billion yuan ($496 million) loss in 2013, Jia was quoted as saying.

He predicted the whole industry will suffer a loss of over 10 billion yuan this year.

Jia said the industry has not seen losses since 2000 till now, according to the report.

Jia also said the sugar processing cost is at least 5,300 yuan per ton, higher than the sugar price of 4,700 yuan per ton, so processing results in losses.