New Delhi: Lower wheat purchases by private players this season might have helped state- owned FCI cross its annual procurement target of 150 lakh (15 million) tonnes as early as May this year. “I think this factor had a big role to play in the development.
Economists expect this to restrain food inflation and check retail prices. We expect to procure as much as 165-175 lakh tonnes by the end of the season. It is only in UP and MP where harvesting is slower and procurement could go on up to June 15,” FCI chief Alok Sinha said here on Friday.
The disclosure of a higher comfort level for the government on the grain stocks front comes even as food prices showed a relatively stable trend here despite inflation shooting up to a 41-month high of 7.57%.
The procurement of wheat in the current year up to May 1 is 72 lakh tonnes more than in the same period last year, according to FCI figures. The current procurement of 155 lakh tonnes accounts for 92.8% of the total arrivals at the mandi compared to only 78.29% last year.
In effect, strictures, including ban on wheat exports, notifications on declaration of big buys by the private sector, higher mandi cess in key producer states and empowerment of state governments to impose stock limits have been highly successful in ensuring that the country’s wheat farmers brought their produce to the mandi for sale to the government at the official support price of Rs 1,000 per quintal.
This, along with a six-month low in global wheat prices that was hit last week, appears to have emboldened the Cetnre to junk its plans of offering an additional bonus Rs 100-150 per quintal to farmers.
Mr Sinha also said India was likely to exceed its target of buying 27 million tonnes of rice in the marketing year to September and had already purchased 23.2 million tonnes so far this year, which is 1.8 million tonnes more than the same period a year ago. India’s bulging rice stocks offer no comfort to countries that face shortfalls.
Export curbs such as those in India and Vietnam have spooked importers like the Philippines and Bangladesh at a time when global stocks have halved from a record high in 2001. An official from Thailand, the world’s biggest rice exporter, said producers were also facing higher costs as prices of inputs like fertilisers had risen.
India, the world’s second-biggest wheat producer, buys grains from local farmers for emergency needs and to feed the poor at lower rates. Government purchases also help farmers avoid distress sales. “Wheat procurement has already surpassed the total procurement made in the last three years.
We are going to buy more. We have the capacity to store up to 25 million tonnes wheat,” Mr Sinha said. Lower wheat purchases by the FCI, the custodian of foodgrains, in the last two years forced the country to import 5.5 million tonnes of the grain in 2006, for the first time in six years.
Economists expect this to restrain food inflation and check retail prices. We expect to procure as much as 165-175 lakh tonnes by the end of the season. It is only in UP and MP where harvesting is slower and procurement could go on up to June 15,” FCI chief Alok Sinha said here on Friday.
The disclosure of a higher comfort level for the government on the grain stocks front comes even as food prices showed a relatively stable trend here despite inflation shooting up to a 41-month high of 7.57%.
The procurement of wheat in the current year up to May 1 is 72 lakh tonnes more than in the same period last year, according to FCI figures. The current procurement of 155 lakh tonnes accounts for 92.8% of the total arrivals at the mandi compared to only 78.29% last year.
In effect, strictures, including ban on wheat exports, notifications on declaration of big buys by the private sector, higher mandi cess in key producer states and empowerment of state governments to impose stock limits have been highly successful in ensuring that the country’s wheat farmers brought their produce to the mandi for sale to the government at the official support price of Rs 1,000 per quintal.
This, along with a six-month low in global wheat prices that was hit last week, appears to have emboldened the Cetnre to junk its plans of offering an additional bonus Rs 100-150 per quintal to farmers.
Mr Sinha also said India was likely to exceed its target of buying 27 million tonnes of rice in the marketing year to September and had already purchased 23.2 million tonnes so far this year, which is 1.8 million tonnes more than the same period a year ago. India’s bulging rice stocks offer no comfort to countries that face shortfalls.
Export curbs such as those in India and Vietnam have spooked importers like the Philippines and Bangladesh at a time when global stocks have halved from a record high in 2001. An official from Thailand, the world’s biggest rice exporter, said producers were also facing higher costs as prices of inputs like fertilisers had risen.
India, the world’s second-biggest wheat producer, buys grains from local farmers for emergency needs and to feed the poor at lower rates. Government purchases also help farmers avoid distress sales. “Wheat procurement has already surpassed the total procurement made in the last three years.
We are going to buy more. We have the capacity to store up to 25 million tonnes wheat,” Mr Sinha said. Lower wheat purchases by the FCI, the custodian of foodgrains, in the last two years forced the country to import 5.5 million tonnes of the grain in 2006, for the first time in six years.
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