Chandigarh, October 19: Six government agencies and millers procured over 59,86,1742 tonnes of paddy on Saturday .An official spokesman today said that PUNGRAIN procured 1481195 tonnes of paddy (27.2%) whereas MARKFED procured 1262010 tonnes of paddy (23.2%).
PUNSUP procured 1244340 tonnes of paddy (22.9%) whereas Punjab State Warehousing Corporation procured 717188 tonnes of paddy (13.2%) besides 6,58857 tonnes of paddy (12.1%) procured by Punjab Agro. The Central Government Agency FCI procured only 72983 tonnes of paddy (1.3%). The Millers procured 549691 tonnes of paddy (9.2 %) by Thursday.
The mandis in Amritsar Division recorded 1768063 tonnes of paddy with Jalandhar recording maximum paddy by Saturday to the tune of 441480 tonnes. The mandis of Ferozepur division maintained their lead by recording 2831284 tonnes of paddy with maximum of 1015552 tonnes of paddy being recorded by Ferozepur district. Meanwhile procurement in the mandis Patiala division recorded 1386827 procurement of paddy with Patiala district recording maximum paddy to the tune of 477519.
The spokesman said that lifting of procured paddy from the mandis has started showing positive results with PUNGRAIN (94.8%), MARKFED (85%), PUNSUP (88.3%), PSWC (88.8%), PUNJAB AGRO (92.1%) and FCI (96.5%).
Six government agencies have paid over Rs. 2982.81 crores for paddy procured by agencies during first 18 days of current Kharif Marketing Season. The spokesman said that farmers of the State are being made payment of paddy procured by the government agencies within 48 hours of lifting of paddy from the procurement centres.
The Punjab Food Supply had setup 1622 procurement centres throughout the state to ensure smooth procurement of paddy.