Andhra Pradesh government to purchase Kharif paddy till March

KAKINADA: The government would purchase paddy in the present Kharif season till March and the farmers need not worry about their crop, civil supplies department commissioner H. Arunkumar has said.

Kumar, along with the officials, inspected the Rythu Bharosa Kendras at Kokkirapadu and Vatluru Pedapadu mandals and visited the paddy fields of Sitaramapuram village in Eluru district on Friday.

He said that the state government is taking all steps to ensure that farmers do not incur any losses due to the cyclonic storm and rain and “every bag of paddy would be purchased from them.”

Kumar said that the government started purchasing paddy from November to avoid inconvenience to the farmers. The government fixed a target of purchasing 37 lakh metric tonnes. However, there is no limit to the purchase of paddy from farmers. For the past two days, 1.10 lakh metric tonnes of paddy was purchased, he said.

“The government had alerted the farmers about the cyclone two days in advance. Now rice millers are requested to purchase the paddy offline.”

He cautioned the farmers not to sell their paddy to mediators below MSP, as the government would purchase the entire paddy from them at MSP without considering the moisture content.

However, a decision has to be taken about the discoloured and damaged paddy, he added.

He said that such paddy would be made ‘test milling’ by the FCI and “we would submit a report to the central government for taking further steps.”

The enumeration would be completed on crop and property losses in the cyclone, within three days, and insurance would be given to the farmers who did not harvest the paddy and incurred loss to their crop due to the rain.

Eluru joint collector Lavanya Veni said 2.67 lakh metric tonnes of paddy was produced in the district in the present Kharif season and 1.10 lakhs metric tonnes was purchased so far. Some 28,000 metric tonnes was shifted to rice mills during the rain.

He said special officers have been appointed to every mandal. A farmer in Pragadavaram village requested the chief minister to purchase his spruced paddy, which had 28 per cent moisture content. The paddy was purchased as instructed by the CM, he said.

Civil supplies officer Satyanarayana Raju, district agriculture officer Ramakrishna and civil supplies corporation manager Manju Bhargavi were present.