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Procurement of chana (gram or chickpea) by National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India (Nafed) at the minimum support price (MSP) has crossed the two million tonnes (mt) in the ongoing rabi marketing. With the pace of market arrivals slowing down amidst improving prices, the trade feels that the overall procurement is unlikely to exceed last year’s levels of 2.59 mt.
“The market arrivals are slowing down and we feel that the total procurement may not exceed last year’s levels. Overall, chana procurement this year is likely to be around 2.3 mt,” said Rahul Chauhan of IGrain India.
As of May 18, Nafed’s chana procurement stood at 2.02 mt. Madhya Pradesh, the largest grower, tops Nafed’s procurement chart with over 0.717 mt, followed by Maharashtra at over 0.671 mt and Gujarat at 0.31 mt. The procurement which started on April 1 is likely to continue till end-June.
Handy stocks to tackle inflation
In Rajasthan, the procurement is over 1.12 lakh tonnes, while in Karnataka over 79,631 tonnes and Andhra Pradesh 64,503 tonnes followed by Telangana at 50,238 tonnes. Except for Karnataka, where the procurement has exceeded last year’s levels by a small margin, Nafed purchases are trailing last year’s levels in other States.
Chauhan said the nodal agency has a carry forward stock of close to 1.46 mt. With the current year’s likely procurement of over 2.3 mt, the total stocks at the end of the procurement season would be over 3.7 mt, equivalent to about a third of domestic consumption. Such huge stocks may come in handy for the Government to keep the prices of pulses under check, especially in the ensuing festival season, Chauhan said. The procurement is still going on.
Prices of chana have improved slightly in the recent weeks on the rising procurement and are currently hovering in the range of ₹4,500-5,175 range across various mandis, but still ruling below the MSP of ₹5,335 per quintal. In Delhi, the Rajasthan chana is ruling in the range of ₹5,050-5,075. “Going forward, the prices are likely to remain range-bound,” Chauhan said.
As per Nafed, total number of farmers benefited by chana procurement exceeds 8.95 lakh and the value of the total chana procured exceeds ₹10,790 crore.
As per the second advance estimate of the Agriculture Ministry, the production of gram in 2022-23 season is estimated at a record 13.632 mt, above the targeted 13.5 mt. Last year, the production of gram stood at 13.54 mt.
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