In the wake of the groundnut price decline and subsequent losses faced by the farmers in Gujarat, Central government agencies, including the National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India Ltd (NAFED), and State-appointed nodal agencies are set to start groundnut procurement at the Minimum Support Price (MSP), from Saturday.

After receiving representations from the Gujarat government for procurement of Groundnut under the Price Support Scheme (PSS) during the current kharif season, the Union Agriculture Ministry approved implementation of the PSS and directed NAFED and the Small Farmers Agri-Business Consortium (SFAC) to initiate the procurement immediately at MSP + Bonus at ₹4,220 per quintal.

A statement issued by the Gujarat agriculture director said the State government would begin groundnut procurement at MSP level on Saturday from 58 centres across the State.

The Gujarat State Cooperative Cotton Federation Ltd has been appointed as the nodal agency to look after procurement in the State.

The 58 procurement centres will be set up in 16 districts, including Rajkot, Morbi, Jamnagar, Bhavnagar, Sabarkantha, Porbandar, Junagadh, Kutch, Amreli, Patan, Banaskantha, Gandhinagar, Devbhumi Dwarka, Gir Somnath, Mehsana and Botad.

Farmers in Gujarat had expected handsome earnings by shifting from cotton to groundnut this kharif season due to past losses. However, their expectations seem to have fallen flat as the prices of the oilseed fell drastically below the MSP level to as low as ₹552 for 20 kg (against the MSP of ₹844).

The state has seen record groundnut sowing on over 16.4 lakh hectares and output is expected to be the highest in three years, at around 26 lakh tonnes.

The State government plans to procure about 1 lakh tonnes of groundnut at the minimum support price, for which it has made a provision of ₹100 crore under the emergency fund.

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