BHUBANESWAR: With only a week left for completion of rabi paddy procurement, the state government on Sunday said 95 per cent of the target has been achieved.
Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare minister Krushna Chandra Patra told mediapersons here that the state government had set a revised target to procure 18 lakh tonne of rabi paddy. So far 17 lakh tonne paddy has been procured which comes to around 95 per cent of the target. June 30 being the last date of procurement, the remaining one lakh tonne will be easily purchased, he said.
The minister said, “Our priority is to purchase paddy from registered farmers well before the expiry of their tokens and ensure that they receive Rs 3,100 per quintal including the Rs 800 input subsidy announced by the government.”
He conceded that procurement got delayed in some districts due to pre-monsoon rains. With limited storage space, mandis would not take the risk of keeping more stock due to high chances of paddy getting soaked. In some areas, farmers who were issued tokens were reportedly turned away due to lack of storage space.
“However, with improvement of weather, procurement has picked up and it will be ensured that paddy of those farmers are procured. We have instructed the district administrations to revise their target if necessary so that all registered farmers can sell their paddy,” the minister said.
While there have been complaints from some districts about non-cooperation of millers in lifting of paddy from mandis, a functionary of the All Odisha Rice Millers’ Association told TNIE that the storage space of all mills are full. “Kharif paddy stored for custom milling for public distribution has not yet been fully exhausted. It is for the government to arrange storage space instead of shifting the responsibility to millers,” he said.
On the supply ration cards, Patra said that six lakh cards approved by the chief minister is under distribution and another 15 lakh new cards will be distributed after getting his approval.