COLOMBO – Sri Lanka has slapped price controls on retail sugar prices after a controversial 50 rupees per kilo import tax pushed up prices steeply.
Sri Lanka’s Consumer Affairs Authority (CAA) ordered a price control of 275 rupees on white sugar and 330 rupees on brown sugar.
If they are in plastic packets, white sugar can be sold at 275 rupees and brown sugar at 350 rupees a kilo.
The tax slapped at midnight has triggered a controversy that it was done to benefit some importers, who clear sugar from ports before the tax.
However, the tax also drives money to cover losses to once expropriated Lanka Sugar.
Lanka Sugar has lost part of its market for ethanol after the government slapped high taxes on alcohol.
-economynext.com
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