Call it the paradox of timing — clear skies when the farmers looked up for rains and it poured when they wanted the sun. First, dry spell during winter, and rains and hailstorm at the time of harvest later washed away all hopes of Punjab farmers to reap a bumper harvest.

Consequently, the state Government has scaled down its procurement target from the earlier 115 lakh metric tonnes (MT) to 100 lakh MT with the loss in yield estimated to be in the range of five to 20 per cent across the state.

But it is the wheat quality that has become a bigger worry for the state already reeling under the problem of plenty with huge stocks of previous year’s wheat still lying with it. Besides, last year’s good minimum support price had prompted farmers to bring more area under wheat cultivation this time.

The weather-beaten wheat arriving at many parts of the state is reported to be poor in parameters of weight, colour and maturity owing to early harvesting of the crop by rain-hit farmers. So even as procurement season in both Punjab and Haryana is drawing to a close and wheat arrivals are comparatively higher by 100 per cent this year, the discoloured and shriveled grains with high moisture content may result in post-harvest losses and pose serious storage challenge, say procurement agencies.

What’s worse, longer storage of this year’s wheat is a possibility that the two states cannot rule out owing to already overflowing stocks, thanks to slow movement of last year’s stocks out of the state by the Food Corporation of India (FCI).

... contd.