A lawmaker is strongly pushing for the creation of the sugar cane industry development fund in a move to revitalize and strengthen the country's sugar cane industry.

Rep. Alfredo Benitez, Third District, Negros Occidental, authored House Bill 6113 which provides for a diversification, development and financial program to promote the interests of sugarcane farmers and planters, mills workers and consumers and contribute to government's food security efforts.

The bill, to be known as the Sugar Cane Industry Development Act of 2012, mandates that the Sugar Fund shall be constituted and collected from the proceeds of 15 percent of the Value Added Tax on the sale and importation of refined sugar, and sugarcane by-products; and the total tariff collected on the importation of raw sugar, refined sugar and premix sugar.

"All the proceeds collected from the above sources shall be remitted in full by the Department of Finance to a separate trust fund maintained by the Philippine Sugar Corporation (PhilSuCor), created under P.D. 1890, on or before August 1 of every year," says the bill, which amends P.D. 1890.

The Sugar Fund shall be utilized to finance the establishment of special economic zones, nuclear farms and agro-industrial districts; and provide financial assistance to sugar farmers, planters and mills for the purchase of seedlings, acquisition of machinery and construction of farm-to-market roads and irrigations.

It shall also be used to conduct researches and related feasibility studies; train mill personnel on current technologies; finance socio-economic programs for sugar farmers and mill workers; and provide scholarships for deserving university/college students taking up courses related to the sugarcane industry.

Benitez lamented the "apparent neglect of the development of sugar by-products, which aggravates uncertainty in the future of the sugarcane industry."

This uncertainty, Benitez said, is further fanned by the impending lifting of the tariff on sugar by 2015.*