The ministry said that sufficient stocks of food grains are available to meet the requirement of National Food Security Act, besides other welfare schemes and additional requirements of PMGKAY are available in the central pool.
The union ministry for consumer affairs, food and public distribution on Sunday asserted that the foodgrains stocks are sufficient and enough food is available to meet domestic requirements. The ministry said it is regularly monitoring the price scenario of essential commodities including wheat and rice and taking corrective measures.
The ministry of consumer affairs, food and public distribution said that the retail and wholesale prices of wheat and rice reported a decrease and prices of wheat atta remained stable during the last week. According to the ministry, prices of wheat and rice have gone up more or less corresponding to the increase in MSP of the farm produce over the past two years.
For instance, the prices were comparatively on the lower side last year because around 80 LMT of food grains were offloaded in the open market through open market sales scheme (OMSS) to contain the prices. It added that because of the unprecedented geo-political situation arising due to the war between Russia and Ukraine, procurement remained on the lower side, and so, the government did not intervene in the market through OMSS.
The government had also imposed export restrictions on wheat and rice as a proactive step to avoid price rise in the domestic market. Besides, the government has also extended Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Ann Yojana for another three months to ensure that poor and needy of the country do not face any hardship during the forthcoming festival season.
The ministry said that sufficient stocks of food grains are available to meet the requirement of National Food Security Act, besides other welfare schemes and additional requirements of PMGKAY are available in the central pool.
Oil prices too being reined in
Simultaneously, the central board of indirect taxes and customs too announced its decision to extend existing concessional import duties on specified edible oils up to 31 March 2023. The move is aimed at increasing domestic supply and keeping prices under control. (The ministry said that the notification to this effect was made on 31 August.)
The concessional customs duty on edible oil import has been extended by another six months until March 2023. Prices of edible oil have been on declining trend driven by fall in global prices. With falling global rates and lower import duties, retail prices of edible oils have fallen considerably in India.
The current duty structure on crude palm oil, Palmolein, palm oil, crude soybean oil, refined soybean oil, crude sunflower oil and refined sunflower oil remains unchanged till 31 March next year, the ministry said.
Import duty on crude varieties of palm oil, soyabean oil and sunflower oil is currently zero. However, the effective duty on crude varieties of these three edible oils touches 5.5 per cent after taking into account the five per cent agri-cess and 10 per cent social welfare cess.
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