‘Modern steel silos to store foodgrains from 2025’

The Union Federal government has chalked out a program for modernising storage of foodgrains in steel silos. By 2024-twenty five, all foodgrains in the nation will be saved in fashionable silos and traditional storage facilities will be phased out step by step, Food and Public Distribution Secretary Sudanshu Pandey mentioned on Thursday.

From this year, the authorities has made a decision to not give authorization to retailer grains in covered plinth and locations that are open to sky. The Centre has cleared an added twenty per cent capability to warehouses that are able of storing extra grains. This solitary phase has served generate an added one hundred sixty lakh tonnes storage capability in current warehouses with a overall capability of 816 lakh tonnes, mentioned Pandey at a press briefing below.

Also browse: Rabi procurement: Stand-off continues over direct payments to Punjab farmers

Procurement businesses have procured 64.seven lakh tonnes (lt) of wheat until Wednesday for the existing rabi advertising and marketing season that commenced on March 15. The Centre is “confident” of procuring the estimated 427.36 lt of wheat, practically 37 lt extra than prior year’s file wheat procurement of 389.ninety three lakh tonnes.

When extra than 30.one lakh tonnes of wheat have been procured in Haryana, twenty.sixty three lakh tonnes and 10.56 lakh tonnes of wheat have been procured in Madhya Pradesh and Punjab, respectively, so far. The overall procurement throughout the corresponding time period very last year was mere sixty tonnes as the procurement operations have been influenced by the sudden lockdown imposed by the Union Federal government at first.

Pandey many thanks Punjab govt

Pandey thanked Punjab Federal government, arhtiyas (commission agents) and farmers in the State for earning direct bank transfer (DBT) doable for wheat procurement under the minimal guidance rate (MSP) scheme for developing buffer shares. The shares are procured by the Food Company of India for distribution of foodgrains through ration retailers and under a variety of welfare schemes.

He certain the arhtiyas that their commission too would be transferred specifically to their bank accounts. Punjab and Haryana have been the very last two States in the nation to transfer to the DBT manner and the scheme is applied from the existing rabi season.

“There is no stakeholder fascination clash or encroachment in Punjab. Arhtiyas are receiving their commission individually through the digital-manner of payment. Before, the MSP was going to farmers through arhtiyas and now it is remaining specifically transferred to farmers on the net,” he mentioned.

Pandey mentioned so far ₹12,800 crore has been transferred to the bank accounts of 6,sixty,593 farmers in 11 States throughout the nation. When procurement commenced in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan on March 15 and in Haryana on April one, it commenced in Punjab on April 10. The Food Secretary mentioned that the procurement will attain even more momentum immediately after Baisakhi, which was celebrated on Tuesday.

Pandey denied that considerable quantities of grains are harmed due to very poor circumstances of godowns in the nation. He mentioned the grains lost due to very poor storage in very last two several years have been .006 per cent and .004 per cent respectively.

In accordance to Pandey, an added storage capability of one hundred lakh tonnes is remaining established in India to strengthen the storage infrastructure. A steel silo of has already appear up in Ahmedabad, while a pilot challenge is going on in Buxar in Bihar to check the viability of steel silos for lengthy-term storage of rice.

The Food Secretary admitted that there is a rate increase in oilseeds but attributed it to a number of intercontinental things these types of as crop damage to oil crops in Latin American countries (Soyabean) and Ukraine (Sunflower). Having said that, he also pointed out that the farmers in the nation benefited as rates of soyabean and castor seeds are ruling higher than MSP.