Insight Focus
Indonesia is one of the world’s largest raw sugar buyers. Offtake in 2025 has been slow. Refiners are still waiting for 2026 permits too.
Indonesia is one of the world’s largest importers of raw sugar, bringing in around 5 million tonnes annually for processing by domestic refineries for supply to the food and beverage sector. When its refiners buy raws can be important for the world sugar market.
The Indonesian government is also trying to increase local sugar output. It aims to reach full self-sufficiency, including industrial and bioethanol needs, by 2030. We will monitor progress here, but it’s worth observing that local sugar production has not exceeded 2.5 million tonnes in the past 10 years, while consumption has risen to exceed 7.5 million tonnes.
Raw sugar prices are near 5-year lows, and so now should be a good time for Indonesia’s sugar refiners. Margins on domestic sales would be excellent. However, raw sugar demand in 2025 has been lower than in each of the previous 3 years. The government hasn’t awarded 200k tonnes special import licences that we’d thought would be released in Q4’25.
Worse, refiners still don’t have 2026 raw sugar import permits, and so are unable to load new crop Thai raw sugars. The slow issuance also means we think refiners are under-covered for most of 2026. Once the government releases 2026 import permits this could lead to a little flurry of buying for the world market.
