Massive Wheat Import Due To Failure In Procurement Process

There is no doubt that India is facing a critical situation in the Agricultural sector which was once India's forte. The government has not only failed to stop farmer suicides in rural India but also due to its spineless wheat procurement program, the Government is already importing almost 55 lakh MT of wheat which is one of the most essential food grain in the country.

Shortfalls lead to rising prices and the people most affected are the ones who do not have access to private supplies.

Although experts believe that the wheat import is not necessarily a bad news for the Indian farmer as the import is not going to hurt him because his crops have already been sold but the government's Procurement Process has left many questions unanswered.
With big corporates coming to the agricultural sector by next year the Government will be faced with a bigger challenge to procure wheat for the public distribution system and its various programmes.

The US department of agriculture (USDA) stated in its recent report that with August 1 wheat stocks at 7.2 million MT and 5.5 million MT imports, the Indian government would have little over 12.5 million MT wheat to manage the public distribution system (PDS) requirement till March.