Purchase of pulses for buffer stock exceeds 10 lakh tonnes

The buffer stock of pulses being created through domestic procurement and imports has crossed 10 lakh tonnes (lt).

Of this, over five lakh tonnes have been procured by various government agencies in the ongoing kharif marketing season, the Food Ministry said in a statement.

The Government had set a target to build a buffer stock of 20 lt to ensure that the prices remain stable.

The Inter-Ministerial Committee (IMC) on prices and availability of select essential commodities, which met on Thursday under the chairmanship of Consumer Affairs Secretary, directed Government agencies such as Food Corporation of India (FCI), National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India (Nafed) and Small Farmers Agribusiness Consortium (SFAC) to continue procurement operations for pulses at the minimum support prices plus bonus.

The government has, so far, opened a total of 971 procurement centres across the key pulses producing states of Karnataka, Maharashtra, Telanagana, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Rajasthan, among others.

FCI has, so far, procured 1.31 lt of pulses, while Nafed has made a total purchase of 3.394 lt. Similarly, SFAC has made a procurement of 57,027 tonnes.

The government has set a pulses procurement target of 9.5 lt for the kharif marketing season 2016-17. This includes 6 lt of tur, 1 lt of urad and 2.5 lt of moong.

So far, a total of 2.3 lakh tonnes of tur has been procured by all the Government agencies, while 86,757 tonnes of urad has been purchased. About 2.1 lakh tonnes of moong has been procured so far by the government agencies.

Similarly, other government agencies such as MMTC and STC have contracted about 4.06 lt of pulses for imports, of which about 2.89 lt has already arrived into the country. Another 1.19 lakh tonne has been procured in kharif 2015-16 and rabi 2016-17 marketing season.

The Food Ministry said the government procurement intervention has helped farmers get remunerative prices for kharif pulses and that it would incentivise the growers to take up cultivation of pulses on a larger scale.

High prices during the kharif planting season had prompted farmers across the country to plant a record area under pulses. According to the government’s advance estimates, the kharif production of pulses has been pegged at 8.7 million tonnes, higher than last year’s 5.54 million tonnes.

Even in the ongoing rabi season, farmers have planted a higher acreage of 160 lakh hectares against last year’s 143.7 lakh hectares.

Of this, gram (chana) has been planted on 99.01 lakh ha, about 10 lakh ha more than last year, while lentils have been planted on 16.65 lakh ha (13.73 lakh ha).

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