Mirpurkhas mills stop crushing for lack of sugar cane supply.

MIRPURKHAS -- All the sugar mills in the district were forced to halt crushing of sugar cane after they received dismally low amount of cane as compared to last year's cane supply mainly because most farmers had ceased sowing the cane and opted for other crops.

Sources said that mill owners were disturbed at lower supply of cane as compared to last year's. The mills could not keep the boilers running because it burned costly furnace oil and cost them more dearly to continue crushing without getting satisfactory amount of cane, said the sources.

The sources said that the mills managements were crushing the cane only for a few hours a day over the past few weeks and finally they decided to close the crushing.

The sources said the situation had forced the mills' managements to compete with each other for...