THE Zimbabwe sugar industry says it suffered a 16 percent drop in domestic sales in the 2023/24 season due to uneven competition from cheaper imports.
According to the country’s biggest sugar producer Hippo Valley Estates in its 2024 annual report, domestic sales volumes for the sugar industry dropped by 54 770 tons, from 338 059 tons in 2023 to 283 289 tons in 2024.
The decline follows the introduction of Statutory Instrument (SI) 80 of 2023 in May, which allowed the duty-free importation of sugar into Zimbabwe.