West Bengal will continue to allow the sale of its potatoes to other States as prices of the spud continue to remain “under control” in the State.
On August 20, the West Bengal government decided to allow inter-state trade of potatoes for the next seven days on the consideration that there would be no shortage of the spud in the State and prices would not rise.
After a meeting with potato traders and all stakeholders, the Mamata Banerjee-led government allowed selling of up to 2 lakh tonnes of the tuber from Bengal to other States for seven days from August 21.
Meet with traders
“Exports are going on smoothly. Prices are under control. If the situation was different, then the government would have imposed the restriction again. As we have not imposed any restrictions that means the inter-state trade will go on. The export will continue,” West Bengal Panchayat Minister Pradip Majumdar told businessline.
Notably, the government met the traders and all the stakeholders and decided to lift the ban on the inter-State trade of potatoes last month after growers and traders staged agitations stating that they would be facing huge losses. “The government will get involved in it (restricting sales to other States) again, only if the situation arises going forward,” Majumdar added.
Usually, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and Assam depend largely on Bengal’s potatoes. West Bengal, the second largest producer of the spud, sells around 20-25 lakh tonnes of excess potatoes to the other States every year.
May allow to continue
The State Government enforced a ban on the inter-State trade of potatoes in July after prices shot up in the State significantly. “The West Bengal government is expected to allow selling of the tuber to other States for a longer period of time as the prices have remained stable,” said Patit Paban De, a senior member of West Bengal Cold Storage Association.
At the cold storage gates, prices of potatoes are varying between ₹23-25 per kg.