Bhubaneswar: The State Cabinet led by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Monday approved the Food and Procurement Policy for Kharif Marketing Season 2021-22.
The Kharif Marketing Season (KMS) 2021-22 will commence from October 1, 2021 and conclude on September 30, 2022. The State Government will procure paddy during Kharif and Rabi seasons separately within the KMS, said Chief Secretary Suresh Chandra Mahapatra.
Cabinet has approved the Policy to regulate all aspects of paddy and rice procurement. A tentative target of 52 lakh Metric Tonne (LMT) in terms of rice has been fixed for KMS 2021-22. In terms of paddy this comes to around 77 LMT, he said.
For Kharif, the tentative target for procurement of paddy would be 63 lakh MT & for Rabi, the target is 14 lakh MT. There is no bar for procurement of any higher quantum if more paddy comes to mandies from registered farmers, Mahapatara said.
The Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare Minister has been authorized to revise this target if the need arises. In KMS 2020-21, paddy to the tune of 77.33 LMT was procured (both Kharif and Rabi included). In terms of rice it comes to 52.35 LMT.
Paddy (Kharif Crop) will be procured in the State during the period from November, 2021 to March, 2022 and Paddy (Rabi Crop) from May to June, 2022.
Paddy will be procured from registered farmers by payment of Minimum Support Price (MSP). Paddy will be milled into rice by Custom Millers appointed for the purpose. The rice obtained will be utilised in State’s Public Distribution System (PDS) to meet requirements under National Food Security Act, State Food Security Scheme & Other Welfare Schemes and the surplus rice will be delivered to the Food Corporation of India (FCI), he said.
As per the policy, paddy will be procured from farmers who are registered in the online portal of FS & CW Department and Aadhaar will be only ID proof for a registered farmer to sell paddy to Government. Sale of paddy is subject to Aadhaar based biometric identification.
All registered and eligible farmers will be intimated in advance by way of SMS to their mobile phones regarding date of sale of paddy and quantity to be sold.
Priority will be given to small and marginal farmers for sale of paddy to the Government. There would be no imposition on farmers to keep aside a certain portion of their produce for personal consumption by their families. A registered farmer can sell his entire surplus, as per approved yield rate, to the Government. This will facilitate entry of more small and marginal farmers into the procurement fold.
Payment of farmers’ dues on account of paddy sold to the Government will be transferred directly to their bank accounts through online mode within 24 to 48 hours.
For smooth functioning of PDS in the State, the Cabinet has extended the license time period of private dealers from five and half years to 6 years.
All PDS related activities in the State are carried out as per the provisions of the OPDS (Control) Order, 2016. The PDS is managed by 13,709 numbers of Fair Price Shops out of which 6,480 are Institutional Dealers and 7,229 are Private Dealers.
Normally, the license of the dealer is renewed if there is no genuine public complaint or no action has been initiated under the Essential Commodities Act against him.
