BEGHIN-SAY SAYS SUGAR OFFER TO EC STILL STANDS

  A plan by European producers to sell
  854,000 tonnes of sugar to European Community intervention
  stocks still stands, Andrea Minguzzi, an official at French
  sugar producer Beghin-Say, said.
      Last week Beghin-Say president Jean-Marc Vernes said a
  possible settlement of a row with the EC would lead producers
  to withdraw their offer, which was made as a protest against EC
  export licensing policies.
      The EC policy is to offer export rebates, which fail to
  give producers an equivalent price to that which they would get
  by offering sugar into intervention stocks, Vernes said.
      But Minguzzi said the offer was a commercial affair and
  that producers had no intention of withdrawing the sugar offer
  already lodged with intervention boards of different European
  countries. He said final quality approval for all the sugar
  offered could come later this week. Some 95 pct had already
  cleared quality specifications.
      The EC can only reject an offer to sell into intervention
  stocks on quality grounds. Minguzzi added that under EC
  regulations, the Community has until early May to pay for the
  sugar. He declined to put an exact figure on the amount of
  sugar offered by Beghin-Say, but said it was below 500,000
  tonnes.
  

