The Grain Drain

A strange affliction seems to have gripped Madhya Pradesh this season.

- Rahul Noronha

The country’s largest producer of wheat after Uttar Pradesh and among its major wheat-buying states is seeing an inexplicable drop in procurement. Till June 25, the last day of procurement, the central Indian state had recorded the purchase of just over 4.8 million tonnes of the staple crop as against the nearly 7.1 MT it had collected in the previous rabi marketing season. What makes Madhya Pradesh an outlier is the fact that other states have procured at either the same levels as last year or even more.

This is especially striking because Madhya Pradesh offers a higher procurement price for wheat than all other states—Rs 2,400 per quintal compared to Rs 2,275, since it pays Rs 125 as bonus per quintal. You would imagine that was sufficient to get its wheat growers to make a beeline for the procurement centres. But the unexplained lethargy is of such an order that many are wondering if it will end up affecting the country’s food security. As June winds down, the stocks with the Food Corporation of India (FCI) stand at 30.3 MT, just slightly more than the buffer norm of 27.5 MT.

Wheat procurement commenced in some districts on March 15 and spread to the entire state by March 25. The last date for procurement was May 15, but this was extended to May 31 and later all the way to June 25 as procurement failed to pick up. Sources in the government say the extension was announced at the behest of the Centre, which, too, is worried about the buffer stocks. India’s total procurement stood at 26.6 MT on June 16, much lower than the target of 37.3 MT for this marketing season. The gap, say experts, is mainly due to the low procurement in Madhya Pradesh.