“The government’s closing balance for wheat will be at its lowest this year,” said Pramod Kumar S, President, Roller Flour Millers’ Federation of India adding that the continuation of export ban will help in restoring it’s stocks.
The Federation expects a record harvest of 106-110 million tonnes this year despite the early onset of summer and excessive rainfall in some wheat growing areas. The record production in tandem with cooling off prices of wheat will enable the government to procure the targeted 340 lakh tonnes of wheat.
Kumar added that the Open Market Sales Scheme (Domestic), which was announced on January 26, 2023 has resulted in a reduction in prices of wheat and wheat products by Rs 600-800 per quintal pan India basis, thereby bringing relief to common people and industry.
Owing to various measures of the Government, Wheat and Wheat Flour (Atta) prices have fallen by Rs 6-8 per kg in the wholesale as well as retail markets in the last two months. According to Roller Flour Millers’ Federation, Atta prices are currently hovering around Rs 2600-3000 per as opposed to Rs 3400- Rs 3800 per quintal in the mid of January 2023.
Due to lesser domestic availability of wheat in the market, domestic prices of wheat went up to Rs 3200-3600 a quintal in January 2023 before the Government announced offloading of 50 lakh tonnes in the open market to arrest the rising prices.
About 32-33 lakh tonnes of wheat has already been offloaded in the market by the FCI through E-auction process that commenced towards end of January this year.