Paddy arrivals in private mills surge across Telangana

Paddy arrivals have surged significantly in the major paddy-growing districts such as Nalgonda and Nizamabad. The majority of paddy deliveries are reaching the rice mills, especially the parboiled mills, as farmers bypass the paddy purchase centers of the Civil Supplies Corporation due to issues with moisture content and weighing. Instead, they are directly selling to private mills.

Farmers are attracted to the parboiled mills, which have been more liberal regarding moisture content as they take the paddy for immediate milling needs. Miryalaguda, which has emerged as a hub of the milling industry, boasts over 418 mills, with a majority of the produce being supplied to states like Kerala. Much of the paddy arriving at Miryalaguda mills is from the irrigated dry ayacut, with nearly 3000 tractor loads of paddy arriving daily.

The arrivals are expected to double once the harvest operations commence in the Nagarjuna Sagar Project left canal ayacut, which extends over approximately 6 lakh acres. However, the millers, who have been lenient with the norms for paddy purchases, may not maintain the same approach once the paddy arrivals increase from the NSP command districts.

Within a week or so, the arrivals at Miryalaguda mills are expected to cross 6000 tractor loads, potentially forcing farmers to return to the paddy purchase centers. Even the district headquarters town of Suryapet, which has over 100 rice mills, only 54 of which are equipped with parboiling technology, cannot match the advanced technology of the 84 mills in Miryalaguda. Each of these mills can process up to 1,500 metric tons of paddy a day.

Some millers have been reported to keep farmers waiting during weekends under the pretext of manpower shortages and technical snags affecting the operation of the mills. This situation could worsen with further increases in paddy arrivals. Currently, the mills at Miryalaguda and Suryapet have purchased over two lakh tons of paddy.

In Nizamabad district, market intervention methods have shown positive results, with private traders competing with civil supplies purchase centers and offering slightly higher prices than those offered under the MSP operations initiative.

The Nalgonda superintendent of police, Sharat Chandra Pawar and his officials inspected the paddy purchase operations at some of the major mills in the district on Tuesday. The Civil Supplies Commissioner, D S Chouhan also made surprise visits to the mills and market yards recently as part of the initiative to maintain a close watch on the MSP operations.

This article has been republished from The Telangana Today.