Takac: Sugar Plant Closure to Reduce Beet Growing Area by 8,000 Hectares

Bratislava, 9 February (TASR) - The total area of 20,000 hectares of land used for growing sugar beat in Slovakia will fall by some 8,000 hectares after the Povazsky cukor sugar factory in Trencianska Tepla (Trencin region) announced last week that it's closing down, Agriculture and Rural Development Minister Richard Takac (Smer-SD) told a briefing on Monday. "We have around 20,000 hectares of agricultural land where sugar beet is grown. There were two sugar refineries, one in Trencianska Tepla and the other one in Sered (Trnava region)," said Takac, adding that after the closure, sugar beet will be cultivated on somewhat over 10,000 hectares. Takac said that he's had several phone calls in recent days in which two private companies expressed interest in submitting a bid to buy the Povazsky cukor refinery, which is owned by Germany's Nordzucker Group. "I don't know what the German owner's reaction will be; expropriating it probably isn't feasible technically," added Takac, who at the end of last week admitted the possibility that the government would make such a bid after carrying out an economic analysis of the company. On Thursday (5 February), majority shareholder Nordzucker Group announced that Povazsky cukor would cease sugar production and sugar beet processing. The company will continue to operate, expanding its activities as a commercial and logistics centre supplying the domestic and other markets in south-eastern Europe. jrg/df