Chief Minister K Rosaiah, on Thursday, met Union Minister of State for Agriculture, Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs, Professor KV Thomas at Hotel Grand Kakatiya and raised important issues that included paddy procurement in the State, making available the required godown space and other concerns, and sought his help to resolve the issues.
Rosaiah reminded the Union minister that he had brought the issues to the notice of the Prime Minister also when he came visiting 2 days ago.
The Chief Minister discussed issues like paddy procurement, construction of godowns, opening of as many paddy procurement centres as required by the Food Corporation of India and also ensuring Minimum Support Price (MSP) to farmers for paddy, pulses, cotton and other farm products in the State.
Thomas assured the Chief Minister that he would take up the issues with the Union Minister For Agriculture Sharad Pawar and initiate required steps.
The Chief Minister told the Union minister that the paddy production for the year was estimated to be around a record 220 lakh MTs and in terms of rice, it was expected to be around 148 lakh MTs. Although it was a very good situation, significant accumulation of stocks over the last few years at the FCI and lack of evacuation due to ban on exports of non-basmati rice was likely to put stress on the procurement activities, Rosaiah told Thomas.
Rosaiah said the State was making all efforts in ensuring MSP to farmers. Over 4500 paddy purchase centres were being opened and the State was also involving women self help groups (SHGs) to take up procurement at the village level itself.
The CM sought the support of Government of India to ensure that there was no hardship to the farmers in the disposal of paddy. The Chief Minister told the Union minister that The FCI was currently holding on to over 34 lakh MTs of food grains in Andhra Pradesh and had got only 5 lakh MTs of clear vacant godown space now.
The capacity of FCI to take over 90 LMTs of rice during the year will be largely dependent on the evacuation of stocks. The CM wanted Thomas to ensure that the FCI go in for paddy procurement activities in a big way at MSP by duly involving the women SHGs to instill confidence in the farming community in Andhra Pradesh.
The Chief Minister once again reiterated the issues that he had raised with the Prime Minister like the FCI going in for 100% advance levy in order to encourage rice millers to make MSP purchases from the farmers.
Rosaiah said that the FCI should also meet the raw rice requirement for Karnataka from Andhra Pradesh instead of Punjab and modify the existing guarantee scheme to facilitate bigger addition to warehousing spaces as suggested by the State. Rosaiah wanted immediate lifting of the ban on export of non-basmati rice for clearing off stocks.