In a move which is expected to boost wheat procurement drive for the current season, the food ministry on Friday relaxed the norms for Punjab, the biggest contributor to the central pool stock, for the harvested crop hit by unseasonal rains.
Food ministry in a communication to Punjab stated that norm for procurement is being relaxed the wheat crop got affected due to untimely rainfall in all the districts of Punjab adjoining Chandigarh.
“This decision will help reduce hardship for farmers and prevent any distress sale of wheat,” Food minister Pralhad Joshi said in a post on X.
Countering Climate Stress
Earlier in the week the ministry has relaxed norms for Haryana and Rajasthan by allowing wheat procurement upto 70% luster loss and increased the shriveled or broken grain limit to 15% from the existing limit of 6%.
The ministry has directed the procuring agencies – Food Corporation of India (FCI) and state agencies to liquidate the wheat procured under the relaxed norms on a priority basis. The procurement volumes are expected to rise sharply in the coming weeks.
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Sluggish Start
The procurement of wheat in the 2026-27 marketing season (April-June) has been sluggish so far with 5.13 million tonne (MT) has been purchased so far from the farmers, a decline of 39% on year. The minimum support price (MSP) purchase is against arrivals of over 8.75 MT of grain in the mandi in the market.
This season the purchase in Punjab, highest contributor to the central pool grain stock, has been rather slow with only 0.5 MT of wheat purchased so far. Over 1.5 MT of grain has arrived in the markets across the state. Punjab contributed 12.2 MT to the central pool in the previous 2025-26 marketing season out of the total purchase of over 30 MT of wheat.
The agencies are aiming to buy over 30 MT of wheat during 2026-27 marketing year from the farmers in key producing states – Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh to bolster stock and ensure supplies under the public distribution system.
At present, the FCI has over 21.5 MT of wheat as the central pool stock against a buffer of 7.46 MT for April 1.
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The agriculture ministry has projected a record 120 MT of wheat output in 2025-2026 crop years (July-June), trade sources said that output is definitely higher than 117 MT in 2024-25 crop year.
The government has announced a MSP of Rs 2585/quintal for current marketing years.
TOPICSWheatThis article was first uploaded on April seventeen, twenty twenty-six, at zero minutes past eleven in the night.