Govt to focus on wheat export, build a global brand for Indian wheat

03 Dec 2012 Evaluate

India’s wheat export is picking up pace in the last few months and also fetching good returns in the international market. The government is hopeful of ending FY13 with 20 million tonnes in stocks, same as the last year, despite a 9.8 million tonnes rise in procurement. This has removed the fears of huge losses that would have occurred as over 6 million tonnes of surplus wheat, which is stored in unscientific places from June. Further, the government is also focusing on to build the international brand of Indian wheat in the global markets by continuously exporting it.

Wheat prices in the world markets started firming up from August onwards because of drought in the United States, the world’s largest exporter and also low production in Australia, Ukraine, Russia and Argentina. On the back of strong response garnered by Indian wheat in global markets, the government is focusing on the idea of regularly exporting wheat from the central pool to build the Indian wheat as a brand in the global market. Off the 22 tenders floated by India to export 2 million tonnes of wheat from central pool since August, all of them, barring one fetched a price of over $300 per tonnes - the highest price of $324 per tonne.

The average price fetched by the wheat exported by government has been around $313 per tonne as against a base price of $228 per tonne.  India has managed to export almost all the wheat from the central pool at a price which is more than $300 per tonne. This clearly shows that Indian wheat is slowly commanding a premium in the international markets because of low global wheat production. High international prices for wheat export will enable the government to decrease export subsidy on wheat to less than Rs 500 crore in 2012-13.

On Nov 30, the government has agreed to allow export of another 2.5 million tonnes of wheat from the central pool over the already cleared 2.0 million tonnes of wheat export. Total 4.5 million tonnes of wheat will be exported from the central pool. The government should continue to export wheat from central stocks in small tranches which would establish India as a reliable player in the global grain market. However the government has also decided to offload around 7 million tonnes of wheat and rice in the domestic market.

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