NEW YORK, Oct 23 (Reuters) -Sugar stocks in Brazil at the start of the current crop in April were at the lowest level on record at 900,000 metric tons, Singapore-based commodities trader Wilmar WLIL.SI said on Wednesday, citing numbers from Brazilian industry group Unica.
Wilmar's Head of Research Karim Salamon said Unica published a revision of its stock numbers, cutting Brazil's Centre-South sugar stocks at the end of March, just before the start of the current crop, to 1.9 million tons from 4.3 million tons estimated previously.
"After a long, detailed, and precise revision of Centre-South sugar stocks, where Unica checked mill by mill, stocks were revised much lower," said Salamon. "It is an astonishing 2.4 million-ton difference," he added.
Unica's sugar stocks data are not public, unlike other production numbers the group releases by-weekly. Only companies that are associated with the group have access to that information.
Wilmar was the main player at ICE's October raw sugar contract expiration, taking delivery of all of the 1.7 million tons that traders sent to the exchange.
Raw sugar prices SBc1 rose 3% in New York earlier in the session on Wednesday.
The market is also keeping an eye on the Datagro International Sugar Conference in Sao Paulo. At the event, Brazil's sugarcane farmers association Orplana projected the 2025/26 Centre-South crop (April-March) at 582 million tons from estimated 590 million tons in 2024/25.
Santa Eliza sugar mill, one of Brazil's largest, believes next year's production will be smaller than projected by Orplana at 560 million tons, saying agricultural yields will be low at around 75 tons per hectare due to this year's drought.
