BHUBANESWAR: An enhancement of the minimum support price (MSP) by the central government for 14 notified crops, including paddy, for kharif marketing season (KMS) 2025-26 notwithstanding, the support price of paddy for farmers in Odisha will likely remain unchanged at Rs 3,100 per quintal.
With the KMS 2025-26 starting from November 1, 2025, the Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare (FS&CW) department in a notification said the price of common variety of paddy has been increased from Rs 2,300 to Rs 2,369 per quintal while the Grade-A variety has been raised from Rs 2,320 to Rs 2,389 per quintal. This is in line with the enhancement of MSP by the Centre in June.
Sources in the FS&CW department said that farmers of the state will continue to get Rs 3,100 per quintal in the current kharif marketing season notwithstanding the upward revision of the MSP by the central government.
The state government has been providing an input assistance of Rs 800 per quintal to farmers from KMS 2024-25, taking the total procurement price to Rs 3,100 per quintal for common variety and Rs 3,120 per quintal for Grade-A variety. Production of Grade-A variety of paddy in the state is insignificant.
“The government has capped the support price of paddy at Rs 3,100 per quintal. The annual revision of paddy MSP by the central government will have no additional impact on the state government which is giving the best price to farmers among all the states,” said sources in FS&CW department.
The sources further added that reports coming in from a section of the media that paddy procurement price has been set at `3,169 for common grade and `3,189 for Grade-A paddy are misleading.
The government has set a target to procure 63 lakh tonne of rice (equivalent to 93 lakh tonne of paddy) for KMS 2025-26 which also includes rabi paddy. The paddy procurement target for kharif season has been fixed at 73 lakh tonne (50 lakh tonne in terms of rice) and 20 lakh tonne for rabi season.
However, there is no bar on procurement of any higher quantum if more paddy comes to mandis from registered farmers, the sources added. The state marked an all-time high record with over 18.5 lakh farmers registering for the sale of surplus paddy under MSP for 2025-26 kharif season as against 17 lakh farmer registrations last year.