Centre May Cancel Wheat Tender Bid As Prices Hit Roof

NEW DELHI: The Centre is still to take a decision on importing more than three lakh tonnes of wheat on account of high price quoted by global trading firms, an official source said on Sunday.
“We are yet to decide on the STC wheat import tender,” the source said. The decision on cancelling or importing the grain may be taken on Monday, the source added.

The state-run State Trading Corporation (STC) had floated the tender on December 10 and bids were valid till December 22. The STC had on December 17 received offers from three multinational firms for importing wheat at a maximum price of $579.6 a tonne, a jump of almost 45% over the price decided by two other government agencies for buying the grain barely weeks ago.

Swiss firm Glencore, US trading company Cargill and Germany’s Toepfer submitted bids in a range of $459.9 to a record of $579.6 per tonne for supply of about 3.2 lakh tonnes, trade sources had said.

An official of a Mumbai-based multinational agri-trading company said it was unlikely that STC will import the wheat at such a high price.

The commerce ministry had earlier this month allowed PEC to import 1.5 lakh tonnes of wheat at $396.9 per tonne. Earlier, on November 23, MMTC decided to buy 3.4 lakh tonnes at an average price of $400.19 a tonne.

Australia-based JK International would supply wheat to PEC, while Cargill and Glencore would supply to MMTC.

The government has decided to import about 23 lakh tonnes of the grain during 2007-08. Before this STC contract, orders had already been placed for import of 17.9 lakh tonnes by STC, MMTC and PEC. Out of these, STC has already imported 13.1 lakh tonnes.