Russia has announced a temporary ban on wheat exports. This is of course not entirely unanticipated. Today, soon after the Russian Prime Minister reportedly announced a temporary grain export ban, prices were seen rising further. Drought conditions have threatened Russian wheat harvest. From record 63.7 million tonnes in 2008-09, wheat production declined by two million tonnes the following year. Drought is now threatening to pull output down to around 50 mt. Russia's wheat exports...
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Rs 60,000 crore is the cost of rotting food grain every year. Yet, millions go hungry by Suman Sahai
EVERY OTHER day there is either a newspaper report or an editorial comment lamenting the loss of food grain stored in buffer stocks. Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar, while prophesying a bumper kharif crop, admits he is worried about not having adequate storage for the produce. At a national conference in 2003, the Central Warehousing Corporation said it had covered storage capacity for 48 million tonnes of food grain. In 2002,...
More »Global Wheat Shortage Feared as Prices Surge by Liam Pleven and Tom Polansek
Wheat prices have staged the most drastic rise in more than 50 years, as a drought in Russia fuels growing worries that it could lead to a global shortage of the grain. Harsh heat and a lack of rain in Russia have killed half of the crop in some hard-hit areas. The slump in production in one of the world's most fertile breadbaskets has pushed prices up 62% since early June,...
More »Buying bad wheat a habit with Punjab? by Vibha Sharma
Continuing with the “well-entrenched trend of corruption and mismanagement” in foodgrain procurement and storage, the food bowl of India- Punjab - this year, too, procured wheat that was highly substandard and damaged. This has been admitted by none other than Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar, who recently said in Parliament that as many as 244 bags of wheat procured by Punjab State Civil Supplies Corporation (PUNSUP) on behalf of the Food Corporation...
More »Something Is Rotten by Anuradha Raman
Systemic Failure * Despite record procurement, poor storage has led to a criminal waste of grain * 61,000 tonnes of grain rotted as it was left in the open during the monsoon * The FCI had shut down storage facilities after low procurement in 2006-07 * The plan for decentralised storage facilities is 40 years old. It’s still hanging fire. * EGoM did not clear the surplus grains for the PDS since it would have...
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