Govt to import more pulses, use price stabilisation fund, says Jaitley

With retail prices of some pulses almost doubling in a year, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley announced some measures to address this. Expanding the price stabilisation fund’s coverage and creating a buffer stock are among these.

His announcement came after an inter-ministerial group he chaired had reviewed the situation.

The government had earlier set up a Rs 500-crore price stabilisation fund for onions and potatoes. It was meant for use by state governments, with the user government to bear half the cost of intervention in this regard, with the other half to come from this fund. The idea was to both give a reasonable price to farmers and affordable rates for consumers. It was recently used by the governments of Andhra and Telangana, to check the price of onions.

As mentioned earlier, Jaitley also said the government had decided to create a buffer stock of lentils, mainly through import. Some stock in this regard was available at the Navi Mumbai port, he told reporters, and states would be requested to lift these.

“The principal concern at the moment is on account of prices of tur daal (pigeon pea). India is normally about a little over two million tonnes short on production in pulses; this shortage is made up by imports. We have had a significant amount of import but there is some global shortage, resulting in escalation of global prices,” Jaitley said.

 

Adding: "Considerably more will be imported, so that the supply-side problem can be taken care of."

Sources said a further 2,000 tonnes will be imported, in addition to the 5,000 tonnes at ports and another 2,000 tonnes already in transit.

"As far the otherwise inflation situation in the country is concerned, it is under control," said Jaitley. "There are only two significant items we have been concerned about. The first was onion (prices), which had shot up because of seasonal variation. Prices have substantially cooled since then and currently it is only pulses whose price needs to be handled. The department of consumer affairs would be the nodal (agency) handling it," Jaitley said.