Sugar is Guatemala's second most important export, following coffee.

"We could say in theory that the sugar cane harvest will be delayed one or two weeks," Armando Boesche, general manager for the Guatemalan Sugar Growers Association (Asazgua), told Reuters. He declined to estimate crop damage.

Miguel Maldonado, production engineer at the nation's second-largest sugar mill, La Union, agreed that the harvest would likely be stalled at least 15 days.

He said sugar cane crops received heavy rains from Hurricane Mitch, which pummeled Central America late last week and over the weekend and killed at least 9,000 people. Some plantations were flooded, he added.

"We haven't been able to get near the fields because access has been flooded, so we can't even quantify the losses," Maldonado said.

Mother Natureserved Guatemala a double blow this year, first from an El Nino-spurred drought and then from Mitch's rains.

The small Central American country produced a record 38.95 million quintals (45.36-kg bags), equivalent to 1.767 million tonnes in the 1997/1998 harvest, and had hoped to reach similar levels in the 1998/1999 season.

Excessive rains will affect the cane's quantity of sucrose, Boesche added, noting the extent of damage will be clear by the end of the year.

Sugar production for the region looked bleak, added the director of the Central American Isthmus Sugar Producers Association (AICA), Jose Orive.

No Guatemalan mills were damaged, but flooding had cut off roads and could prevent sugar cane harvest, he said.

"Honduras is the most affected country, with access to five of seven mills only by air or boat," Orive said.

He added that floods in San Miguel, El Salvador, would also affect the sugar harvest in that country, while Chinandega, Nicaragua, mills were additionally flooded.