NEW DELHI: The government is set to take a slew of measures to contain the stubborn retail food inflation, including through intervention in pulses markets, a senior official said on Thursday.
“While the retail intervention in selling pulses is challenging, it is an effective way to curb the possibility of increase in prices,” Rohit Kumar Singh, secretary, department of consumer affairs, told FE.
Under the plan, the government would continue to sell chana through retail initiative – Bharat Dal – as well as offload surplus stocks of estimated 2.4 million tonne (MT) of the variety with the farmers cooperative Nafed. This is expected to keep wholesale prices from flaring up.
Earlier this month, the Centre had launched the sale of wheat flour at a subsidised rate of Rs 27.50/ kg under the brand name ‘Bharat Atta’ across the country to provide relief to consumers from high prices. Retail wheat prices rose by 7.93% last month.
The government is also selling onions at Rs 25/kg through more than 3000 outlets. The onion retail inflation rose by 42.08.82% in October.
So far around 0.15 MT of chana has been sold through 3500 retail points of Nafed, national cooperative federation of India (NCCF), Kendriya Bhandar, Safal and mobile units through Bharat Dal initiative. The government has been monitoring the real time sales under the initiative across states using geographic information systems (GIS) based mechanisms.
In July, the government had commenced selling chana dal in retail packs under brand name Bharat Dal at highly subsidized rates of Rs.60/kg pack and Rs 55/kg for 30 kg pack to make pulses available to consumers at affordable prices.
“Through retail invention, the government is ensuring that pulses become more accessible and affordable for all,” Harsha Rai , Head, Mayur Global Corporation, leading pulses trading firm, said
The retail inflation in ‘pulses and products’ category in October rose to 18.79%. The inflation last month of the chana split variety rose to 11.16%.
The government through its wholesale interventions has been selling Nafed’s stock in the open market through e-auctions. However trade sources said that Nafed this week has sold chana in the open market from its stock from various locations in the price band of Rs 58 – Rs 63/kg, which is above the Minimum Support Price (MSP) for 2024-25 season of Rs 54.4/kg.
The chana dal is also made available to state governments for supplies under various welfare schemes and distribution through their consumer cooperative outlets.
Nafed has purchased 2.3 MT of chana 2023-24 marketing season (April-June) from farmers under the price support scheme (PSS) or MSP operations of agriculture ministry while in the previous season, the federation had purchased 2.59 MT of pulses variety from the farmers
“After keeping a buffer of 1 MT of chana, we will be selling the rest of the surplus stock in the open market as well as through retail outlets to increase supplies in the market till March next year,” an official said.
Out of a record pulses production of 26.05 MT in 2022-23 crop year, chana (gram) has a share of 50%. The country has been self-sufficient in chana and moong varieties of pulses.
Source: The Financial Express
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