Weekly review of Paddy Purchase - 60 PPCs to function in Burdwan

This year Paddy harvesting started late in Burdwan, the rice bowl of the country due to late monsoon. New paddy harvest has started coming to Paddy Purchase Centres and Rice Mills only from second half of December 2012. District authority conducted weekly review on 29th December 2012.

• State intervention on Paddy Procurement from Rice Mills as Levy and through State Agencies as CMR rice has been strengthened further this year, involving block administration and more number of capable Cooperative Societies.
• Weekly monitoring of progress in done at District level with FCI, DCFS, Rice Mills and all agencies involved.
• As per the reports, 80000 MT Paddy has been purchased so far by the PPCs and Rice mills.
• There are 35 PPCs already functioning in the district and the number is likely to go up to 60 by first week of January 2013. Further, 139 Cooperative Societies has been persuaded to do the procurement for CMR agencies and efforts are on to operational their Purchase Centres within January 2013.
• A PPC may purchase any quantity of Paddy per day depending upon the capacity of space and transport arrangements made by rice mills tagged to it. Up to 50 bags paddy per farmer at a time can be accepted. On an average at least  1000 to 1500 Quintals paddy per day per PPC should be purchased.
• So, with 60 PPCs the capacity is approximately 70000 Quintals per day. It means 7000 MT per day for next three months. District target is 4.5 lakhs MT rice including Levy Rice to be purchased from Rice mills against paddy being purchased by them at MSP.
• All blocks will please once again call rice mills and Societies at block office and direct them to purchase all the paddy offered by farmers at Minimum Support Price of Rs 1250 per quintal.
• Blocks are also advised to sort out issues related to FAQ, that means the organic matter plus inert material to be deducted (also called dhos) and develop consensus. Effective meetings at block level involving rice mills and other stakeholders will yield good results as was done last year.
• At present only 250 rice mills have started purchasing paddy from farmers and there is no information on rest 146 functional Rice Mills. They should be pressurised to do paddy purchase from farmers like previous years. All rice mills are required to offer levy as per rules and shall not be issued Levy Free certificate of the rice for sale in the market if they don't follow the direction to Purchase Paddy at MSP. Collection of Levy rice from Mills by FCI has started and will continue but CMR rice should be given highest priority in the go downs. Rice mills has to deliver the CMR first otherwise Levy will not be accepted.
• This year, Direct PPCs are functioning in large number covering all the blocks. 17 more PPCs to be functional in a week as Purchase Officers have already joined. At these PPCs, instant cheque payment in favour of farmer is done on the spot by the PO. We expect the same from rice mills also.
• Further, in order to ensure cash with Cooperative Societies, funds have been arranged to them as far as possible and payments to CMR agencies on fortnightly basis is to be made.
• Block level close monitoring and review of PPC wise Paddy dispatch, milling and supply to go downs is very much required to ensure success of Paddy Procurement. All blocks please take action accordingly.