Govt mulls strategy to lower flour prices

Measures being taken to ensure regular supply of wheat to flour mills, says official

ISLAMABAD:

Ministry of National Food Security and Research in collaboration with provincial governments is working to form a mechanism to bring down the price of flour to make it affordable and to keep the demand and supply of the commodity at a stable level in local markets across the country.

Food Security Commissioner Dr Imtiaz Ali Gopang said the government is taking measures to ensure an uninterrupted supply of wheat to flour mills across the country and strengthening vigilance to discourage smuggling, hoarding and extra profiteering.

Speaking to the media, he attributed the recent price hike of flour in local markets to an increase in the minimum support price of wheat from Rs1800 per 40 kg to Rs2200 per 40 kg, and the public sector's decision to stop releasing grains from its official stocks to local millers on controlled rates as the procurement campaign for current season was in progress.

He said that the government was also providing wheat to flour mills on subsidised rates in order to provide cheap flour during Ramazan. He added that during the procurement season, releases from the public sector had stopped which was also another factor of the price differential in local markets.

He said that the government was working to form a mechanism to release wheat for local flour mills on subsidised rates to ensure a provision of flour on affordable prices, and keeping the supply at smooth level across the local markets in the country.

He further informed that the wheat stocks in the country during the first week of this month was recorded at 7.853 million tons against the reserves of 4.866 million tons in the corresponding month of last year.

Meanwhile, local wheat procurement reached 5.990 million tons against the procurement of 5.810 million tons of same period of last year, he said. He added that carry forward stocks of grains in the country stood at 1.845 million tons as compared to the stocks of 731,033 tons of the same period last year. Gopang said that Punjab had procured over 4.055 million tons of wheat during the current grains procurement season achieving 101.38% of its assigned targets, Sindh procured 719,782 metric tons and Balochistan 15,287 metric tons. "Meanwhile, Pakistan Agriculture Storage and Supplies Corporations had procured about 1.2 million tons of wheat," he said adding that wheat procurement targets were fixed at 6.900 million tons in order to fulfil the domestic requirements as well as for maintaining strategic reserves.

 

Published in The Express Tribune, May 10^th, 2022.