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U.S. 2025/26 Sugar Supply and Use Are Forecast Lower; Mexico’s 2025/26 Sugar Balance Sheet Is Mostly Unchanged
The U.S. 2025/26 sugar supply is forecast at 13.773 million short tons, raw value (STRV), down 17,000 STRV from last month, as the decrease in production more than offset the increase in beginning stocks. Sugar imports are virtually unchanged at 2.474 million STRV, the lowest level since 2007/08. The additional refined specialty tariff-rate quota (TRQ), which historically was filled by organic sugar imports, was not announced by USDA at the time of the World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report. Sugar deliveries for food and beverage use are lowered 25,000 STRV to 12.125 million, matching the 2024/25 estimate, which was reduced this month by the same amount. With the other use component unchanged at 105,000 STRV, the 2025/26 total sugar use is lowered 25,000 STRV to 12.330 million. The corresponding stocks-to-use ratio is slightly up from 11.6 to 11.7 percent. Per the terms of suspension agreements, the initial 2025/26 Mexican Export Limit to achieve a 13.5-percent stocks-to-use ratio in the U.S. balance sheet will be announced by the U.S. Department of Commerce next month, using the July WASDE.
Mexico’s 2025/26 sugar production is unchanged from last month at 5.094 million metric tons (MT), a 7-percent recovery from the weather-affected 2024/25 campaign. Mexico’s total sugar exports are projected down by 10,000 MT but exports to the United States (under the terms of the suspension agreements) remain at 572,489 MT. This volume was carried over from last month which was projected under the assumption that the U.S. additional specialty TRQ (when announced) would be no lower than the 2024/25 level (231,485 STRV). The rest of the variables in the 2025/26 balance sheet are unchanged, except for a slight downward adjustment in beginning stocks.