MBABANE – The Eswatini sugar industry, one of the country’s economic cornerstones, is positioning itself for long-term growth amid fluctuating global markets, evolving trade regimes and mounting climate challenges.
According to the Eswatini Sugar’s Integrated Annual Report 2025, the sector remains resilient, contributing 6.3 per cent to the national gross domestic product (GDP) and accounting for a quarter of Eswatini’s export earnings, with over 16 000 people directly employed across its value chain.
Although as global sugar markets brace for declining prices and shifting demand patterns, and as climate change continues to affect yields, the industry is urgently pursuing innovations, sustainability measures and market diversification strategies to secure its future.
The report paints a complex global picture for sugar. The 2024/25 season is projected to register a global production decline to 174.8 million tonnes, down from 181.3 million tonnes the previous year, largely due to adverse weather, pest infestations and sucrose diversion to ethanol production.
Simultaneously, consumption is expected to rise slightly to 180.3 million tonnes, widening the global deficit to 5.5 million tonnes—the largest in nearly a decade. Yet despite this deficit, world prices remain volatile as trade volumes drop, consumer preferences shift toward low-sugar products and geopolitical tensions disrupt supply chains.
“The international sugar market will remain volatile in the face of shifting developments in global trade, climate risks and consumer trends,” the report warns, noting that both imports and exports are projected to fall by over 5 million tonnes this season. Compounding these concerns, the rise of weight-loss drugs suppressing sugar consumption, increasing competition from alternative sweeteners and fluctuating oil prices influencing ethanol demand continue to inject uncertainty into long-term market forecasts.
Closer to home, the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) is expected to transform regional trade dynamics. As sugar consumption in sub-Saharan Africa grows steadily, driven by urbanisation and population expansion in markets such as Nigeria, Kenya and Ethiopia, the region faces a paradox: Rising demand but irregular production due to infrastructure gaps, high input costs and regulatory bottlenecks.
“Intra-regional trade is gaining momentum, and sugar imports from outside Africa are expected to dwindle as local production expands,” the report notes, highlighting that several African governments are now offering incentives to boost domestic sugar output. For Eswatini, this presents an opportunity to supply deficit regional markets. However, competition is intensifying as informal sugar imports-often smuggled-distort regional prices, undermining formal trade channels and squeezing producer margins. It is worth noting that during the 2024/25 season, total cane production rose 4 per cent to 5.36 million tonnes in the 2024/25 season, with sugar output reaching 640 738 tonnes. Yet, the report flags declining cane and sucrose yields over the past decade as a major threat to industry viability.
“Diminishing yields mean lower production, lower income and profitability, putting pressure on growers who may abandon cane for alternative crops if returns continue to shrink,” it cautions.
Several factors drive this trend:
- Climate change is bringing erratic rainfall, higher temperatures, and extreme weather events.
- Rising input costs for fuel, fertilisers and labour.
- Pest and disease outbreaks affecting crop quality.
- Shortages of cane cutters, prompting costly mechanisation investments.
In response, ESA is rolling out industry-wide replanting programmes with climate-resilient, high-yield cane varieties, accelerating the release of new cultivars sourced from South Africa, Mauritius, Réunion and Zimbabwe.
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Market strategy focuses on diversification, value addition
MBABANE – Eswatini currently sells about 73 per cent of its sugar to the Southern African Customs Union (SACU) market, with the remainder split between the EU/UK (21 per cent), the US (4 per cent), and regional deficit markets (2 per cent).
While SACU remains the priority market due to stable returns and free movement of goods under the customs union arrangement, ESA acknowledges the risks of overreliance on a single market.
The report notes that new trade flows into Rwanda, Kenya and the Democratic Republic of Congo gained traction in 2024/25, and trial shipments to Angola are underway despite the absence of preferential access under SADC agreements.
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