Sugar market to register small deficit in 2026/27, says broker Czarnikow

[LONDON] The global sugar market will be in a modest deficit of 600,000 metric tons in the 2026/27 season, thanks largely to reduced output in the European Union, sugar broker and supply chain services company Czarnikow said on Wednesday (Jul 8).

A record-breaking heatwave in Europe, the world’s third-largest sugar grower, has put the region’s sugar beet crop at risk. Factories are also struggling to break even and so beet plantings have been reduced.

“We have cut our 2026/27 EU-27 sugar production forecast to 13.9 million tonnes after the European Commission’s preliminary beet area estimates pointed to a smaller planted area,” said Czarnikow.

The broker said that given the large surplus in 2025/26, a small deficit next season does not create a global shortage but it does leave less room for further crop disappointments in other key producers later in the season.

These are more likely than not. The United Nations weather agency last week raised its forecast for the El Nino weather pattern to “strong” and warned it could further revise it to “very strong” in the coming months. The weather pattern typically brings dry, hot conditions in key sugar growers India and Thailand during the crop development phase, as well as excess rains that can delay and harm harvest quality in top grower Brazil. REUTERS