More than 44 lakh metric tonnes of wheat which works out to about 70 per cent of the target has been procured by the State procurement agencies from the mandis (grain markets) of Haryana. The State Government had fixed a procurement target of 65 lakh metric tonnes of wheat for the current season. The procurement target was reduced from 75 lakh metric tonnes to 65 lMT following crop damage due to incessant rains and hailstorm in Haryana.
A spokesman of the Food and Supplies Department said that 95 per cent of the payment had already been made to the farmers for the wheat procured. Against the due amount of Rs3,837 crore, a sum of Rs3,625 crore has been paid to the farmers for the wheat procured. He added that every grain has been procured at the rate of Rs1450 per quintal irrespective of the damage.
Giving details, the spokesperson said that more than 44.37 lakh metric tonnes of wheat has been procured by the Department of Food and Supplies, Haryana Agro Industries and Haryana Warehousing Corporation, up to April 26, 2015 as compared to 48.7 lakh metric tonnes procured by the same date last year.
Even though the process was delayed by more than ten days this year due to rains, the purchase of wheat has picked up pace and is not far behind the figure of last year, said the spokesman adding that it was 48 lakh metric tonnes last year. Notably, the incessant rains and hailstorm in the past couple of months had delayed the harvesting and procurement process during the current Rabi marketing season and had also resulted in huge losses to the state farmers in Haryana.