Food grain wastage reduced by over four times in last five years: RTI report

By Abhishek Anand

The government has managed to save over four times more food grains stored in granaries across the country, a Right to Information (RTI) report revealed. According to the reply, the wastage of food grains, largely due to rain, was reduced more than four times from 2018 to 2023.

Kerala-based RTI activist K Govindan Nampoothiry had sought information about the details of foodgrains being perished at the storage facilities of the Food Corporation of India (FCI). It was found that during the year 2018-19, the total perished food grains was 5213 metric tons, which was reduced to 1628 metric tons during the year 2022-23.

“Despite a longer spell of rain in the latter months of the monsoon, the FCI has managed to save a drastic quantity of food grains. The close to four-time decline in perished food grains means the agencies are working for better storage facilities. There is a steep decline in food grains stocks accrued as non-issuable in FCI godowns,” said Govindan.

The states of Bihar, Odisha, Assam, Andhra Pradesh, Punjab, and Gujarat topped in non-issuable foodgrains, the RTI revealed.

“As per the RTI reply, during 2019-20, 1930 MTs of foodgrains perished, during year 2020-21, 1850 and during year 2021-22, 1693 metric tons of food grains perished. It shows a steep decline in the wastage of food grain,” said Govindan.

In a bid to stop wastage of food grains, the central government adopted FIFO (first in-first out) policy during the tenure of former food and consumer affairs minister Ram Vilas Paswan.

The FIFO policy helped in increasing the shelf life of the food grains stored at FCI granaries across the country.

This article has been republished from Indiatoday