The Solvent Extractors’ Association (SEA) of India is estimating the mustard crop output at 120 lakh tonnes (lt), provided, the weather condition remains favourable for the rest of the rabi season.

In a letter to the members , Atul Chaturvedi, President of the association, said mustard is likely to witness almost 30 per cent higher crop numbers during rabi. “We should not be surprised if the magical figure of 120 lt is achieved in mustard,” he said.

Farmers are enthused by the price of rapeseed-mustard seed ruling over ₹80,000 a tonne, an increase of over 30 per cent compared to last year. They have positively responded by increasing area under rapeseed-mustard-taramira to 81.66 lakh hectares as on December 9 compared with 65.97 lakh hectares during the same period a year ago.

“Now if weather condition remains favourable for the remaining rabi period, we could expect a crop of around 120 lt,” he said.

SEA, jointly with Solidaridad, is organising model farms of rapeseed for enhancing the income of farmers with the goal of increasing rapeseed-mustard production to 200 lt within the next four years.

He said around 500 model farms have been set up across 115 villages in the districts of Bundi, Kota, Tonk, Baran, Jhalawar in Rajasthan; and Mandsaur in Madhya Pradesh. The Directorate of Rapeseed and Mustard is also supporting this initiative by providing technical knowledge and support. He said this initiative has helped over 20,000 farmers from Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh.

GMO counterproductive

He said that FSSAI (Food Safety and Standards Authority of India) has recently issued draft regulation on genetically modified organisms (GMO) intended for direct use, for food or for processing, and food or processed food containing GM ingredients.

“While we generally welcome this move, we feel it would be counterproductive as far as edible oil is concerned. We have cautioned the government that smooth supply chain in edible oils could be seriously impacted as its very difficult to segregate GM and non-GM in case of edible oils. The proposals are at draft stage and we have registered our objections,” he said.

Cooking oil prices

Stating that the edible oil sector witnessed a roller coaster ride during 2021, he said first there was demand destruction resulting in collapse of prices and then the return of the pent-up demand. This ensured the retail inflation for oil and fats reaching alarming level of 29.67 per cent during November raising the hackles of not only the bureaucracy but the political class as well.

“Edible oil import duties have been slashed, storage control order reissued, trading on commodity exchanges banned and host of other measures are being taken to rein in prices. What effect it will have at ground level is a matter of conjecture,” Chaturvedi said.

In all this upheaval and high prices of oils and oilseeds, farmers have responded wonderfully for the price signals. Record crops of around 82 lt of groundnut and 120 lt of soyabean are being harvested, he said.

Stating that many States and union territories are imposing very low stock limit of oils for manufacturers and trade, he said this is hampering free and smooth flow of oils from factories to the consumers and is rather counterproductive. SEA has written to the Uttar Pradesh Government to increase the stock limits of oils held by the trade so that there is no shortage due to stock limit and the consumer receives the oil at a fair price, he added.

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