Sugar Producer Considers Brazil Cogen Sale

Shree Renuka Sugars is considering the sale of the energy cogeneration units of its Equipav and Revati plants in Brazil, Gautam Watve, its head of strategy and planning, tells LatinFinance. “We are looking at focusing on our core business of sugar and ethanol, and that is the reason we are looking at the cogen sale,” Watve adds. Proceeds would go toward deleveraging the assets, which had high debt levels when the Indian sugar producer bought the mills. Watve declines to offer further details on any financing or the timing of a sale, noting only that the company has spoken to interested parties. Shree Renuka bought the two mills in Sao Paulo state last year, marking its first acquisitions in LatAm. Shree Renuka had $485m in debt at its Brazilian operations as of Sept. 30. The company last week announced a consolidated net loss of INR6.16bn ($121m) for Q4, due mainly to lower sales and a Brazil-related foreign exchange loss of INR5.70bn.