NAFED sells over 2 lakh bales cotton in a week

Last week contributed 40 to 50% of total sales.

In the wake of increased demand for cotton, National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Fedration of India Limited (NAFED) has managed to offload more than 2 lakh bales of cotton in a single week.

Interestingly, last week sales account for appoximately 40 to 50 per cent of the total cotton sold by the agency so far during the season.

NAFED, another government agency which procures cotton on Minimum Support Price (MSP), has so far purchased 36 lakh bales (180 lakh quintals) of cotton from across the country. "Out of the total procurement, NAFED has so far sold more than 5 lakh bales at different prices", said UKS Chauhan, managing director, NAFED.

According to cotton traders, the government agency sold cotton in the range of 2 lakh to 2.5 lakh bales in last one week. When contacted, NAFED officials confirmed that it has offloaded large chunk of cotton in previous week.

Cotton purchased from NAFED has mainly gone to export market as the agency has so far sold cotton on average price of Rs. 22,000 per bale. As against this, CCI, which has mainly purchased Sankar-6 variety of cotton, which is currently being quoted in the range of Rs. 23,000 to Rs. 23,500 per candy.

"Cotton purchased from NAFED has been exported by some of the players since cotton exports from the country is viable only when it is available at Rs. 22,000 per candy or below that level", said a leading cotton trader from Ahmedabad.

It may be mentioned here that CCI offers discounts on cotton sold by it, while NAFED has not been given that advantage as a result its sales are slower than CCI. Storage facility is yet another problem that NAFED is facing.

Currently, around 7 lakh bales are lying outside storage facilities and 3 lakh more bales are under processing. NAFED intends to sell the stock before the monsoon.