ISLAMABAD - Pakistan Sugar Mills Association (PSMA) Tuesday urged the Government to restrict export of Gur to Afghanistan to stabilise the price of sugar at home, sources informed TheNation on Tuesday. Sources who attended a meeting held at the Finance Ministry on the prevailing sugar crisis informed TheNation that PSMA also suggested that the Government adopt free market mechanism. The Association and the Ministry of Industries and Production also gave detailed presentations on the said issue. The meeting feared the crisis might deepen further, as the commodity was continuously being smuggled to India and Afghanistan due to much higher prices there. It was revealed that sugar was available at Rs 120/kg in Afghanistan and Rs 90/kg in India as against the price of Rs 70/kg in Pakistan. It was informed at the meeting that the remarkable disparity of sugar rates between Pakistan and its neighbouring countries had triggered smuggling of the commodity to the mentioned countries. The participants of the meeting were also informed that in the current year, the country would face one million tones shortage of sugar. In the current year, total demand of sugar is around 4.2m tones while production is around 3.2 million tones, it was informed, and that the Government has already approved the import of sugar in order to fulfil the shortage. Trading Corporation of Pakistan and private sector would import sugar. TCP would import 0.5 million tones of sugar while same quantity would be imported by the private sector. Officials of Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Industries and Production, Ministry of Food and Agriculture, officials of the provisional Governments and representatives of All Pakistan Sugar Mills Association were also present at the meeting.