Govt releases addtional 36,000 tonmes rice

New Delhi, Sep 19 (UNI) Anticipating a rising demand during the festive season, the Government has assured that it is comfortably placed with the release of additional stocks of 36,000 tonnes of rice and 1,92,000 tonnes of wheat at APL level to various states.

This is part of the steps taken by the government to maintain adequate availability of foodgrains, edible oils and sugar, a release issued by the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution said.

Earlier, with a view to keep the prices of foodgrains in the open market under check, the Government had made ad-hoc allocation of about 96,500 tonnes of wheat under the APL category for July to September 2008 in addition to 63,000 tonnes of wheat at APL rate for September.

Meanwhile, the rice procurement in kharif marketing season (KMS), as on September 15 stood at 276.08 lakh tonnes against the overall procurement of 251.07 lakh tonnes in KMS 2006-07, registering an almost 10 per cent rise, the release said.

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