New Delhi: Wheat procurement during the Rabi Marketing Season (RMS) 2024-25 is going on smoothly in the major procuring states across India. 262.48 lakh metric tonnes of wheat has already been procured so far this year in the Central pool surpassing last year’s total procurement of 262.02 LMT, the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food & Public Distribution, Government of India, informed on Friday.
A total of 22.31 lakh farmers have benefitted during RMS 2024-25 with a total minimum support price (MSP) outflow to the tune of Rs. 59,715 crores. Major contribution in the procurement came from five procuring states such as Punjab, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh with wheat procurement of 124.26 LMT, 71.49 LMT, 47.78 LMT, 9.66 LMT and 9.07 LMT respectively, the ministry said in a PIB release.
You may also like to read: ISMA releases India’s sugar production estimates; seeks 2 million tonnes exports
The rice procurement is also progressing smoothly. 728.42 LMT paddy equivalent to 489.15 LMT of rice has been so far procured directly from 98.26 lakh farmers during Kharif Marketing Season (KMS) 2023-24, with a total MSP outflow of approximately Rs. 160,472 crores, the ministry said.
With the above quantity of procurement, the combined stock of wheat and rice at present in the Central pool surpassed 600 lakh metric tonnes which put the country in a comfortable position to meet its requirements of food grains under Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana (PMGKAY) and other welfare schemes and for market interventions too, the PIB release stated.
As of March 2024, some global agencies estimated India’s wheat production for the 2023-24 crop year at 110 million tonnes, which would be a record for the rabi crop. This is slightly lower than the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare’s projection of 112.02 MT. However, these figures are subject to change based on crop-cutting experiments.
