The problem is not the amount of cane bring produced, which looks like staying reasonably high, but reduced tonnages expected to be harvested and lower sugar content in the cane.

Firm figures still do not exist on how much cane will be harvested in the key state of Queensland. Sugar content, known in the industry as CCS, remains about one percentage point lower than last year.

Further rain in northern parts of the sugar belt continues to plague this year's crush, which until a month ago was thought headed for a new record.

"People are not getting as much cane off as they should for this time of year. It's almost certain now that cane will be left behind and unharvested for this year," Ross Chapman, deputy general manager of grower organisation CANEGROWERS, said. It was still not known howmuch cane would be left behind and not harvested, he said.

"It depends on how much more rain we get."

CANEGROWERS continues to believe that next year's crop will be hit harder than the 1998 crop, with planting cane seriously disrupted by weather damage.

"The real downside is that cane that was newly planted was rained on and did not come up. It has been too wet to Re-plant. Now it's too late. The impact for next year will be quite substantial," Chapman said.

More than one million tonnes of cane in Australia's previously forecast total crop of 41.6 million tonnes has been damaged. CANEGROWERS now believed that the loss of raw sugar production could be closer to 300,000 tonnes than earlier estimates of 200,000 tonnes, Chapman said.

This would cut Queensland's raws output to less than five million tonnes from the earlier predicted 5.2 million tonnes for the state and 5.54 million tonnes for Australia overall.

Rain had continued to fall in far North Queensland, while further South some fine weather incentral areas had allowed cane cutting to proceed, Chapman said.

"The far North continues to be very wet," he said.

Rain might possibly increase the size of the cane crop but the issue was whether the cane would be harvested, he said.

CANEGROWERS reported earlier that in its latest week, to September 26, a still-low 1.59 million tonnes of cane was crushed, about steady with the week before but down by 211,479 tonnes on the same week in 1997. This brought the crush so far this year to 22.11 million tonnes, almost two million tonnes less than the 24.05 million tonnes crushed at the same time last year.

Sugar content was also down at an average of 12.68 per cent against 13.77 per cent at the same time last year. The Australian Cane Farmers Association said in its latest Australian Sugar Digest that heavy rainfall had had a significant influence on the crop.

"The majority of the cane left to cut has lodged and sucker growth that has been widespread will certainly continue and have some bearing on moretonnage by way of extraneous matter and a CCS that probably will remain constant," it said.

CANEGROWERS' official estimate is still for a Queensland cane crop of 39.19 million tonnes in 1998.

"But it's going to be less than that," Chapman said.