By Laxman Kafle
Kathmandu, Nov. 6: The state-owned Food Management and Trading Company (FMTC) has started buying paddy from farmers. The company is buying 60,000 tonnes of paddy this year.
The company has started purchasing paddy from October 29, said Srimani Raj Khanal, divisional chief of FMTC.
Stating that paddy procurement has started from Rajapur in Banke and Tikapur in Kailali districts, he said that the company has planned to purchase paddy from 11 districts of the Terai region.
He said that the company had purchased around 4,600 quintals of paddy so far.
The company would purchase paddy from Mahendranagar, Dhangadhi, Nepalgunj, Tulsipur, Bhairahawa, Birgunj, Janakpur, Lahan, Biratnagar and Birtamod.
According to him, the company has been purchasing paddy based on the minimum support price fixed by the government and the present market price. The government had fixed the support price of paddy before the paddy plantation period began this year.
The price of coarse paddy has been fixed at Rs. 2,735 per quintal and medium quality paddy at Rs. 2,885 per quintal.
Last year, the FMTC was unable to purchase paddy as per the target due to higher price sought by the traders than the minimum support price, he said, adding that the FMTC’s target was to support the famers so that they could sell their products at reasonable price.
Last year, it purchased only 22,000 tonnes against the target of 30,000 tonnes.
The FMTC sells its own brand of rice by threshing the paddy bought from the farmers.
The government fixed the minimum support price of paddy and directed the FMTC to purchase paddy from the farmers to control price hike and not allow dropping the support price, said Khanal.
After the FMTC started purchasing paddy based on the minimum support price, the farmers have started benefitting directly, said Nara Bahadur Kadayat, a farmer of Tikapur, Kailali.
Kadayat, who came to sell paddy at the Tikapur-based FMTC depot on Thursday morning, said that the farmers had come to the company as it bought paddy at a higher price than the price offered by the local traders.
Local traders are buying paddy at Rs. 2,000 to Rs. 2,300 per quintal while the FMTC is buying coarse paddy at Rs. 2,735 per quintal.
He said that there was a crowd of people at the Tikapur depot of FMTC to sell their crop.
"I arrived at the depot this morning with about 8-10 quintal of paddy. But my turn has not come till afternoon. Farmers have to wait for their turn by taking tokens,” he said.
Balbir Chaudhary, another farmer, said that he arrived in Tikapur depot on Wednesday to sell his paddy.
“We have to wait for two days to sell paddy due to the long queue of farmers,” he said.
He asked the FMTC management to arrange for required labour and weighing balance to help farmers sell their paddy within a day of their arrival at the depot.
Chetman Kadayat, chief of Tikapur depot of FMTC, said that the farmers were queuing to sell the paddy due to increase in the flow of farmers at the depot.
“We are purchasing paddy from farmers on the first come first serve basis. From Wednesday, we started providing coupons to the farmers for their turn,” he said.
According to him, they have been providing 60 coupons to the farmers daily.
The flow of farmers at the depots has been increasing from Tuesday when it began to purchase the paddy, he said.
“Farmers are in haste to sell their paddy fearing that the FMTC would not purchase paddy after meeting its targeted quota,” he said.
Tikapur depot has set a target to purchase around 65,000 quintals of paddy from the farmers of the district this year.
“Considering the crowd of farmers at Tikapur depot, we will start purchasing paddy from Joshipur and Bhajani of Kailali within few days,” he said.