Bhubaneswar: Get ready to pay more for your favourite sweets this festive season. A steep rise in sugar prices, which is already squeezing household grocery budgets, is now set to make sweets costlier in the state, with sweetmeat makers bracing for a price hike ahead of the festive season.From around Rs 40 a kg barely two months ago, sugar is now retailing at Rs 60-64 a kg. Wholesale prices have risen to Rs 6,000-6,400 per quintal from around Rs 4,100 in June, traders said. With festive demand expected to pick up in the coming weeks, sweetmakers say consumers would soon feel the impact of the surge through higher prices of rasagola and other popular sweets.Bimbadhar Behera, president of Utkala Mistanna Byabasayee Samiti, said sweet prices would surely rise, though the extent of the hike would be decided soon. “It is becoming increasingly difficult for us to manage rising cost of production. Three key inputs are required for making sweets — LPG, sugar and milk or chhena. In the past few days, prices of all three have spiralled. A commercial LPG cylinder now costs around Rs 3,000, milk prices have risen by Rs 4 a litre, while sugar has become costlier by Rs 20-25 a kg,” he said.At Pahala, the state’s largest rasagola market with around 100 outlets, makers are preparing to revise prices as they struggle to absorb rising production costs.The price of chhena has also risen by Rs 40 a kg, from Rs 180 to Rs 220 since May. Makers said prices of rasagola, chhenapoda and chhena gaja — the three main sweets produced in Pahala — are likely to rise within the next week or fortnight.The market has witnessed price revisions in the past when input costs rose sharply. In 2023, following a significant increase in milk prices, the price of a Rs 5 rasagola was raised to Rs 6, while the Rs 10 variant was increased to Rs 12. Similarly, the price of a Rs 20 rasagola was raised to Rs 25.Pahala Sweet Traders’ Association will meet next week to decide the extent of the proposed hike. “Either the size of the rasagola will have to come down or the price will have to rise. We have already reduced the size over the past few years. So, increasing the price now appears to be the more viable option,” said Rajkishore Sahu, president of Prachi Rasagola Market at Pahala.The impact is also being felt in Nayagarh, state’s biggest chhenapoda market, where makers are considering a price increase of around Rs 20 a kg. Rakesh Sahoo, a chhenapoda maker and seller in Daspalla, said the sweet is currently selling at Rs 300 a kg, but makers are finding it increasingly difficult to absorb the higher production costs. “The price has not been increased yet, but we are now considering raising it by Rs 20 a kg or a little more,” he said.Meanwhile, traders attributed the rise in sugar prices to lower sugarcane production, diversion of sugar for ethanol production and higher transportation costs.Sudhakar Panda, general secretary of Odisha Byabasayee Sangha, said sugarcane production this year was not sufficient to meet the country’s requirement, affecting sugar production at a time when demand was expected to rise ahead of the festive season. “Besides, sugar is being diverted for ethanol production and transportation costs have also increased, adding to the landed cost in Odisha,” Panda said.Odisha meets much of its sugar requirement through supplies from other states as its own commercial production remains low, with several sugar mills non-operational.