Wheat procurement yet to start in Punjab, Haryana

Wheat procurement for the central pool has not started yet in Punjab and Haryana, amid delayed harvesting because of immature crop.
Barring negligible arrivals in Punjab, wheat growers at majority of places are yet to harvest the crop for sale in grain markets, officials said here.
"There has been no purchase of wheat crop for central pool so far," an official of Food Corporation of India said here today.
Wheat arrivals are expected to trickle in after April 15 in Punjab and crop purchase will pick up from April 20, the official said, adding that the "peak of crop arrivals when daily arrivals reach 7-8 lakh tonne is expected to come during April 27-28."

However, he said only 218 tonnes of crop arrived in grain markets has been purchased by private traders so far in the state.
Punjab, the food bowl of country, had witnessed wheat procurement of 3,590 tonnes including private purchase of 260 tonnes till April 10 last year. In Haryana, there was no crop procurement in corresponding period during last year.

Because of untimely rains last month, wheat crop remained unripe in both states, delaying harvesting by at least 10 days.
Wheat procurement season starts from April 1 in Punjab and Haryana.
In Haryana as well, no crop procurement took place so far because of delayed harvesting.

"Farmers were also busy during elections in Haryana which was also one of the reasons in delayed harvesting. Now elections are over, farmers will now focus on harvesting," an official of FCI (Haryana) said.
"We expect arrivals to start from Tuesday next week in Haryana," he said.
Both agrarian states Punjab and Haryana are eying crop purchase of 185 lakh tonne (LT) for central pool, 10 per cent higher over last season's procurement.
Punjab targets 115 lakh tonnes while Haryana looks to buy 65 lakh tonnes of wheat in the current season.
Last year, wheat purchase for central pool was 109.5 lakh tonne and 58.82 lakh tonne from Punjab and Haryana respectively.

Punjab and Haryana are eyeing wheat production of 168 LT and 123 LT, respectively, for current season.
Punjab and Haryana has set up 1,700 and 372 centres respectively for crop procurement.