Wheat procurement breaches 26 MMT mark; surpasses last year's by 7.4 MMT

Wheat procurement during the ongoing Rabi marketing season (RMS) 2023-2024 till May 30, 2023, has progressed to reach 26.2 million metric tonnes (MMT), said the Ministry of consumer affairs, food and public distribution in a release.

The wheat procurement has surpassed last year's procurement of 18.8 MMT by 7.4 MMT, according to the release.

The ministry further added that 2.127 million farmers have already benefitted from the ongoing wheat procurement operations with a Minimum Support Price (MSP) outflow of about Rs. 47,000 crores. 

It also stated that the major contribution in the procurement has come from three procuring states of Punjab, Madhya Pradesh, and Haryana with procurement of 12.127 MMT, 7.098 MMT, and 6.317 MMT respectively.

According to the ministry, what helped the healthy procurement was the grant relaxation by the central government in quality specifications of wheat affected due to untimely rains; the opening of procurement centers at village/ panchayat level; carrying out procurement through Co-operative Societies/ Gram Panchayats/ Arhatias etc. in addition to designated procurement centers for better outreach and permission to engage FPOs for procurement operations.

The ministry also added that the rice procurement is progressing smoothly as well with a total of 38.5 MMT of rice procured till May 30 during the Kharif marketing season. Another 11 MMT of rice will be procured, according to the statement from the ministry.

"The combined stock position of wheat and rice in the Central Pool is over 57.9 MMT (Wheat 31.2 MMT and Rice 26.7 MMT) which has placed the country in a comfortable position to meet its requirements of food grains," said the ministry.