Rice procurement by the Food Corporation of India for the government’s buffer stocks has declined 4.4 per cent year-on-year to 161.3 lakh tonnes (lt) as of November 15 since the marketing season began on October 1. It was 9 per cent lower at the end of October than the year-ago period, indicating higher purchases made in the past fortnight as the gap has been reduced.
Procurement was 168.75 lt as of November 15, 2022. In the first fortnight of this month, as much as 57.77 lt of rice have been purchased for the Central Pool against 54.62 lt in the year-ago period.
Purchase target
The government has set a target to purchase 521.27 lt of rice from kharif-grown crop in the 2023-24 season (October-September). The Agriculture Ministry has estimated the kharif rice production to fall by 4 per cent to 106.31 million tonnes (mt) in the current kharif season from 110.51 mt year-ago.
“Though purchases have increased in the last fortnight, the overall quantity is still less by about 10 lt in absolute terms compared with the 2021 kharif season. While there was a deficient monsoon last year in key growing States of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, the driest August in 2023 affected paddy crop in most of the States. There is also delayed arrival in many parts where re-sowing was done,” an official source said.
Though Punjab’s contribution to the Central Pool stock was down by 13 per cent in the first month, the purchases have reached 108.7 lt as of November 15, down by 4.4 per cent from 113.70 lt. The government has set a target to buy 122 lt of rice from Punjab by the end of November. Earlier this week, the State government reopened nearly 300 purchase centres amid protest by farmers.
Due to re-sowing in some districts following heavy rainfall and lodging, paddy arrival started late as harvest got delayed. Initially, the government thought that lower output and better prices drove farmers to sell outside the government system, but later it realised the problem and has now allowed procurement at 285 centres, officials said. “If required, the Centre will be approached to extend the paddy procurement period beyond November 30,” an official source in the State said.
Haryana misses target?
In Haryana, the rice procurement got completed on November 15 and so far 38.91 lt of the cereal has been purchased, which is a tad lower from 38.93 lt year-ago. The State had set a target to buy 40 lt this year for the Central pool. There could be some upward adjustment of 1-2 lt in rice procurement when data in Haryana are collated as last year too the purchases finally showed at 39.77 lt, sources said.
The official purchase in Uttar Pradesh has been recorded at 1.57 lt, down by 34 per cent from 2.39 lt year-ago. So far, the procurement is on the expected line as the production in the State is also estimated to drop from the normal level in the 2023-24 kharif season.
Rice procurement in Tamil Nadu has reached 3.63 lt, which is 37 per cent lower from 5.74 lt in the year-ago period. Procurement in Telangana has also started and it showed 2.26 lt of rice has been purchased by the government, up from only about 4,000 tonnes year-ago.
Chhattisgarh has also started procurement and initial data for past 15 days show that rice purchases were 2.65 lt against 3.56 lt year-ago. There may be some slowdown in procurement until the formation of next government in the State since both Congress and BJP have promised to raise minimum support price (MSP) of paddy to ₹3,100-3,200/quintal.
In June, the Centre announced a 7 per cent hike in MSP of paddy to ₹2,183 per quintal (common variety) and ₹2,203 per quintal ‘A’ grade.