SAO PAULO, May 7 (Reuters) - The sugar and ethanol divisionof Brazilian conglomerate Cosan SA said lateWednesday its sugar output in the 2014/15 season fell more than9 percent from the previous season after drought crimped canedevelopment.
Raizen, the joint venture between Cosan and Royal DutchShell produced 4.08 million tonnes in the cane cropyear that ended in March, down from 4.49 million tonnes theprevious season.
Raizen's ethanol output, the other component produced fromcrushing cane in Brazil, was up just over 1 percent at 2.06billion liters over the same period, Cosan said in its quarterlyearnings report.
Cosan, which include natural gas and fuels distribution,port, railway and land management assets, posted a net loss of43.7 million reais ($13 million) in the first quarter of 2015,compared to a 256.1 million real gain a year ago.
The results were hurt by costs involved in takeover ofBrazil's largest railway operator America Latina Logistica, alsoknown as ALL.
Raizen operates 24 sugar and ethanol mills, making it theworld's largest sugar and ethanol producer.
Brazil's cane belt began crushing the new crop in April andis expected to recover slightly from last year's drought afterrains started to normalize in recent months.
The company forecast its 2015/16 cane crushing at 57 millionto 60 million tonnes depending on rains, which would surpasslast season's crush by 3 million tonnes in the best casescenario.
Raizen expects to produce 4.2 million to 4.4 million tonnesof sugar, and 1.9 billion to 2.1 billion tonnes of ethanol.
(Reporting by Reese Ewing and Roberto Samora; Editing byMeredith Mazzilli)
