The cotton season of 2020-21 is probably to finish by March 2021 due to heavy arrivals in the marketplace, with cotton growers fearing a different lockdown, prime officials of the Cotton Corporation of India (CCI) mentioned. The CCI has procured some 67 lakh bales (each and every bale weighing 170 kg) till date in the ongoing season at a price of Rs 19,048.87 crore. This is just about double the quantity of cotton it procured in the year-ago period.
“The pace of arrivals is very fast, maybe because of Covid fears, with Europe and the UK getting into another lockdown. Farmers fear that prices may not rise further,” PK Agrawal, CMD at CCI, mentioned. “Prices are currently ruling at Rs 6,000 per quintal while the MSP is at Rs 5,825, and farmers feel this is a fair price. Moreover, there have been quality issues this season, especially with the long staple cotton of 30 mm because of which growers are in a hurry to sell their crop,” he mentioned.
The delay in rains as properly as excessive rains have triggered troubles in the crop in Telangana, Maharashtra and Saurashtra, he mentioned. In Maharashtra, the crop has been hit by pink bollworm, although heavy unseasonal rains impacted the crop in Saurashtra as properly as Telangana, Agrawal explained.
Usually, sales choose up immediately after January as farmers choose to dry their crop immediately after selecting in hope of greater returns. However, each day arrivals are now to the tune of 3-3.25 lakh bales and some 140 lakh bales have arrived in the marketplace so far, he mentioned.
Telangana has recorded the highest procurement, exactly where 4.83 lakh farmers sold 21.86 lakh bales to the CCI. Maharashtra with 2.05 lakh farmers promoting 10.99 lakh bales has come second. In Gujarat, 38,021 farmers brought 1.92 lakh bales. Overall, 12.66 lakh farmers have sold 65.10 lakh bales to the CCI, for which they have been paid Rs 19,048.87 crore as per the minimum help cost (MSP) of Rs 5,825 per quintal.
Procurement operations are in progress across Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Telangana Andhra Pradesh, Odisha and Karnataka. Agrawal, even so, feels the corporation could not be in a position to obtain more than one hundred-120 lakh bales, against the original estimate of 200 lakh bales, due to the fact of a poor crop. The crop estimates have been lowered to much less than 350 lakh bales from 380 lakh bales predicted earlier. Prices are anticipated to stay firm, he mentioned.
The Cotton Association of India has retained crop production at 356 lakh bales for 2020-21. The association has projected cotton exports to fall by about 10% to 54 lakh bales from an earlier projection of 60 lakh bales.