KARACHI (Reuters) - Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) will issue tenders in April to import 700,000 tonnes of white sugar if private traders remain wary of using tax breaks to buy supplies after prices hit a record high last week. The TCP is already in the market through six tenders floated since Dec. 31 to import a total of 500,000 tonnes of white sugar to meet demand and rein in prices. The tenders will be opened this month, with the first one for 150,000 tonnes of white sugar on Saturday. However Pakistan faces the market as white sugar demand forecast in the coming months from India, Indonesia and other Asian countries sent white sugar futures in London to a record high of $767 per tonne last week. We will have to import to meet shortages, TCP Chairman Saeed Ahmed Khan told Reuters in an interview on Tuesday. We will start issuing fresh tenders in April for 700,000 tonnes of sugar if the private sector does not come in. The government has encouraged the private sector to import another 750,000 tonnes by waiving excise and sales tax if it is bought and imported before June 1. However, traders are reluctant to tap the international market at a time of high prices, and fear government intervention if they try to sell sugar imports at a price reflecting the cost. Khan said the govt had asked the TCP for a plan to ensure that all sugar now in the pipeline and any new supplies would arrive in Pakistan by July. PHILIPPINE DISCUSSIONS Khan said the sugar shortfall in Pakistan would become more visible in April when the sugarcane-crushing season ends and stock levels start falling. Pakistan produced 3.2 million tonnes of refined sugar in the 2008/09 crop, and the country imported 225,000 tonnes of sugar last year to meet demand. The TCP is aiming to get the sugar it has already tendered for by mid-May and Khan said his agency would have 300,000 to 400,000 tonnes of imported sugar by April to start feeding the market in case of supply problems. It already had about 110,000 tonnes of white sugar from last years imports, he said. Pakistan was also in discussions with the Philippine Veterans Investment Development Corporation to buy sugar and had sent specifications, but no bids had been offered, he said. Kaira said last week that the Philippines had offered to provide Pakistan with 1 million tonnes of sugar and could take rice in exchange. A day later, a senior Philippines government official said the government was unaware of any such offer, and could not export 1 million tonnes of sugar to any country even if it was spread over a 3-year period. The government of the United Arab Emirates had also made an offer to Pakistan on a government-to-government level for supplying sugar, Khan said. Pakistan would buy from the cheapest source, he said.