China planned to increase its reserve of homemade sugar by 600,000 tons this year to protect sugarcane farmers amid bumper harvest, the State Development and Reform Commission said in Beijing on Monday.

Altogether 1.1 millions of homemade sugar will be purchased, the commission said in a statement on its website.

The move was designed to shore up sluggish sugar prices on the Chinese market to protect the interests of sugarcane growers, it said.

The reserve systems under the central government and Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in southern China, the country's cane sugar production base, will each purchase and stockpile 300,000 tons.

Sugar prices remained sluggish due to a rapid increase in output in the current refining season of 2007-2008, which is coming to an end, said the commission.

(Xinhua News Agency June 16, 2008)