Grain markets in Ludhiana district filled to the brim, tardy lifting to blame
Grain markets (mandis) are filled to the brim as paddy glut continues to prevail in the district.
With the paddy arrival and procurement picking up pace, almost all 146 grain markets (mandis), including 38 temporary yards, across 13 market committees of Ludhiana are chock-a-block with yet-to-be-milled rice lying in the open as well as filled in gunny bags.
However, purchase and payments are going on smoothly with four government agencies – Pungrain, Markfed, Punsup and Punjab State Warehousing Corporation (PSWC) – procuring up to 85 per cent of the arrived stocks and paying 127 per cent of the due amount to the farmers in the state’s biggest and largest district, in terms of area and population.
Neither commission agents (arhtiyas) have yet bought a single grain nor has the Central agency - Food Corporation of India (FCI) - begun the purchase till Friday.
With almost 83 per cent of the procured paddy not yet lifted, the mandis are flooded with the purchased as well as the fresh arriving grains.
“We are having adequate arrangements for lifting the procured paddy, but the shortage of storage space is responsible for the backlog,” District Food and Supplies Controller (DFSC) Geeta Bishambu told The Tribune this evening.
She said the district administration and the Food and Civil Supplies Department in collaboration with the government agencies on job had made adequate arrangements to ensure instant purchase and timely payments to the farmers, but the space crunch was hampering the lifting pace.
“We have 497 rice shellers in the district, of which 339 have applied, 282 have been allotted and 202 have already signed the agreements for storage and milling of procured paddy but their godowns are still full with the milled rice of the previous season due to non-clearance by the FCI,” she detailed, while hoping that the lifting will soon pick up pace after the godowns of rice millers are freed of the previous stocks.
Sharing daily purchase report, the DFSC said with the fresh arrival of 25,187.8 metric tonnes (MT) of paddy on Friday, the progressive arrival has reached 1,94,957.5 MT, of which 1,69,110.2 MT, accounting for 86.74 per cent of the total arrival, has already been purchased in the district till this evening.
She said the pace of procurement was much faster than the daily arrival. Against the arrival of 25,187.8 MT grains, 25,308 MT was purchased during the day.
On the lifting front, as many as 7,785 MT of procured paddy was lifted on Friday, which took the progressive lifting figure to 32,406 MT. This was 19.16 per cent of the total purchased stocks with 1,36,704.2 MT, accounting for 80.84 per cent of the total procurement, yet to be lifted from the mandis.
Geeta said the lifting had also picked up gradually with 30 per cent of the total purchase made during the past 72 hours already been lifted.
She disclosed that the payments amounting to Rs 60.5 crore were made to the farmers on Friday, which took the progressive payment tally to Rs 379.7 crore, accounting for 128 per cent of the total Rs 295.7 crore payment due within 48 hours of the purchase.
The agency-wise procurement data showed that Pungrain was leading the charge with the purchase of maximum 69,857 MT, which accounted for over 41 per cent of the total procurement, followed by Markfed buying 43,614.4 MT, Punsup 29,517.8 MT and PSWC procuring 26,121 MT of the progressive procurement till Friday.
However, the FCI and the private traders continue to remain away from the procurement process.
Official: Adequate arrangements in place
District Food and Supplies Controller (DFSC) Geeta Bishambu said the district administration and the Food and Civil Supplies Department in collaboration with the government agencies on job had made adequate arrangements to ensure instant purchase and timely payments to the farmers, but the space crunch was hampering the lifting pace.
