GUWAHATI, Nov 18 - The Food Corporation of India (FCI) has set a target of around 68,000 metric tonnes of paddy to be procured from the farmers of Assam in the 2018-19 marketing year, said Kumar Gaurav, member-FCI, Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution.
In the meantime, the FCI is also going to carry out an awareness drive across the State among the farmers to increase the amount of paddy procurement.
It may be mentioned here that the rate of paddy procurement in Assam is very less in comparison to the other States of the country. According to Gaurav, in the 2017-18 marketing year, the FCI had procured only 50 per cent paddy despite its estimated amount.
This year, the Centre has set Rs 1,750 per quintal of paddy as the minimum support price of paddy for the farmers of the country. For the 2017-18 year, the minimum support price of paddy was Rs 1,550 per quintal.
The FCI, the nodal central agency of the Government of India, along with other State agencies undertakes procurement of wheat and paddy under price support scheme. Coarse grains are procured by State government agencies for the central pool as per the direction issued by the Government of India from time to time. The procurement under price support is taken up mainly to ensure remunerative prices to the farmers for their produce which works as an incentive for achieving better production.
Before the harvest during each Rabi or Kharif crop season, the Government of India announces the minimum support prices (MSP) for procurement on the basis of recommendations of the Commission of Agricultural Cost and Prices (CACP) which along with other factors take into consideration the cost of various agricultural inputs and the reasonable margin for the farmers for their produce.
Recently, Kumar Gaurav has written a letter to the Commissioner of the Food and Civil Supply Department, Assam to issue necessary notification and take steps for maximum procurement of food grain items like paddy, etc. in the State.
�The government policy of procurement of food grains has a broad objective of ensuring maximum support price to the farmers and availability of food grains to the weaker sections at affordable prices. It also ensures effective market intervention thereby keeping the prices under control and also adding to the overall food security of the country,� Kumar Gaurav added.
He stated that the awareness drive will be carried out in collaboration with the local social organisations by the officials of the FCI in every district.