In 1988, the Fiji Sugar Corporation marked a significant milestone in its expansion efforts with the commissioning of Fiji’s largest sugar crusher at Labasa Mill, as reported in The Fiji Times on August 26 of that year.
The $1.8 million crusher was the first enhancement to the mill’s crushing system since the mill was founded in 1894 by the Colonial Sugar Refining Company. Labasa Mill was the third sugar mill established in Fiji, following the Penang and Rarawai mills.
The crusher was purchased from Puna Mills in Hawaii in late 1987 after the Hawaiian operation closed due to excessively high production costs. Engineers from the Fiji Sugar Corporation traveled to Hawaii in 1987 to disassemble the equipment, which was then shipped to Labasa for assembly under their supervision.
This project was part of a broader $42 million investment designated by the FSC for the mill’s extension since it took over from CSR in 1973. When the new crusher was inaugurated, FSC board chairman Lyle Cupit noted that Labasa Mill had a stable capital expenditure share of 32%, highlighting the mill’s development priorities.
The corporation had invested $130 million in upgrading all four mills over the previous 15 years, which included enhancements such as bulk sugar storage and port facilities at Malau, a modern boiler, a completely new feeding station, and additional evaporators and pans. The Malau facilities enhanced FSC’s ability to efficiently crush cane within a reasonable season while enabling effective sugar storage and shipment.
The new crusher features 84-inch rollers, pressure feed rollers, gearings, and a 1000-horsepower turbine drive, distinguished by its size compared to existing crushers. Cupit emphasized that while the addition of the crusher would lead to only a slight increase in throughput, its overall impact would be significant.
Designed to improve the extraction of sugar juice from bagasse, the new equipment aims to enhance extraction from the current 5% to between 3.5% and 4%. It also adds a safety net; if one of the three existing crushers were to fail, operations would continue without interruption.
Construction on the new crusher began in early March 1988, supervised by Sheik Ahmed from the corporation’s Suva headquarters and engineer Jack Sinclair from Lautoka Mill. FSC also planned to install a similar crusher from Walkers of Australia in the upcoming slack season to replace the existing number three crusher.
Once operational, Labasa would possess the largest and most technologically advanced milling setup in the country’s sugar industry. The three existing crushers, though originally installed in 1894, have undergone numerous modifications over the years to boost their crushing capacity in response to rising cane production.
With the implementation of the new crusher, Labasa Mill is set to process 1.2 million tonnes of cane over a 30-week season, averaging 400,000 tonnes per week. Cupit expressed that the decision to add a new crusher at Labasa Mill reflects both pride for the FSC and advancement for the sugar industry.