Anticipating favourable conditions and increased coverage, a senior official from the food ministry said that wheat production is projected to reach a new milestone of 114 million tonnes in the current 2023-24 crop year. The final phase of sowing for wheat, the primary rabi crop, is currently underway and is expected to continue until the following week. According to official data, wheat had been planted in 320.54 lakh hectares till the last week. In the preceding 2022-23 crop year (July-June), wheat production achieved a record 110.55 million tonnes, surpassing 107.7 million tonnes from the previous year.
What did FCI Charman say?
Speaking to reporters, Food Corporation of India (FCI) Chairman and Managing Director Ashok K Meena, said, "We expect that total area under cultivation of wheat will increase this year and God willingly if the climate is alright, the production will be 114 million tonne that's what the agriculture ministry has indicated informally to us." He further said that the area sown to wheat crop is also showing an increase compared to the previous year. There was a deficit of one per cent in some states but that will also be made up in the first week of January, Meena stated.
"If that is the level of production, we are very confident that we will be able to procure more than our requirement and also additional stocks needed for the Open Market Sale Scheme (OMSS) for next year," the FCI Chairman added. When asked about whether the central nodal agency intends to increase procurement, given the opening wheat balance of 76 lakh tonnes scheduled for April 1, which is only sufficient to meet the buffer requirement, the FCI chief stated, "We will make every effort to ensure the minimum support price (MSP) for all farmers. Due to open market sales, there are indications that prices have stabilized and are not higher than last year. Since the wheat MSP is higher by 7 per cent than last year, we hope that a lot of farmers will be willing to give their produce to the FCI."
Last year, the FCI's wheat procurement stood at 26.2 million tonnes, higher than the annual buffer requirement of 18.4 million tonnes. This year's wheat crop will be ready for harvest from April onwards. FCI is the central nodal agency that buys rice and wheat to ensure MSP to the farmers and distributes the grains for free to 81 crore poor via ration shops. It also uses surplus grain via OMSS to boost domestic availability and check prices.
Curbing wheat & rice inflation through OMSS
According to FCI, 5.9 million tonnes of wheat has been sold in the open market through weekly e-auction under the OMSS since June 2023, which has helped stabilise the retail prices. "There has been hardly any increase in retail wheat prices on YoY basis," the FCI Chairman said, adding that wheat OMSS will continue only till March 15. However in the case of rice, there is "of course an uptick in prices visible in the open market but the mere fact that we are making huge quantity of rice available through OMSS, I hope that the prices will also not increase substantially", he said.
There has been a lukewarm response for rice under OMSS and so far the FCI has been able to sell only 1.45 lakh tonnes at Rs 29 per kg through weekly auctions.
The FCI is using surplus foodgrain stock of 15.6 million tonnes for undertaking market intervention to stabilise the prices of two key commodities. "Our OMSS intervention has helped stabilise prices of these two commodities. Rice and wheat being important parts of the CPI basket, we would hope that food-related inflation will get controlled to the maximum possible," the FCI chief added.
(With PTI inputs)
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