ISLAMABAD, June 19: Despite having achieved 90 per cent of the wheat procurement target of five million tonnes so far, the government is not planning to lift ban on export till the end of the season, it is learnt.

The wheat prices have increased over the past few days, particularly in Sindh where the official procurement target is yet to be achieved. The government has fixed five million tonnes of wheat procurement target for the current year to ensure a minimum support price of Rs425 per 40kg to the farmers and to use this stock as strategic reserve for price stabilisation.

Of the total five million tonnes, Punjab was assigned to purchase three million tonnes, Sindh was to procure 0.7 million tonnes, while the Pakistan Agricultural Storage and Supplies Corporation (Passco) had been given a target of 1.3 million tonnes of wheat buying. “So far, about 90 per cent of the procurement target has been achieved and the process is still in progress,” spokesman of the federal food and agriculture ministry Seerat Asghar told Dawn.

Responding to a question on the rise in wheat price, he said the government had fixed a support price for the farmers and could intervene only in case of a fall in wheat price below Rs425 per 40kg. He said the five million tonnes wheat procurement in the public sector was also meant for use as strategic reserve for release in the market in case of a surge in flour prices.

He said the flour prices fluctuated in a narrow band of 23 paisa per kg since the start of March this year so there was no need at present to make releases from the strategic reserves. He said the government expected the prices to come down in the next few weeks because there were enough stocks available.

He said the government was not concerned with the rise in wheat prices unless it affects the flour price. The flour prices are stabilised through the strategic reserves as stocks are then released to the flour mills to keep the market within permissible limits.

Pakistan produced more than 23.5 million tonnes wheat this year, against a domestic estimated annual consumption of about 22.5 million tonnes. Last year, wheat production stood at 21.7 million tonnes. Mr Seerat said the private parties, who had purchased wheat in anticipation of exports amid market hype, have already started facing losses and were now offloading their stocks. About 1.5-2 million tonnes of wheat was still in the hands of speculators, market sources said.

The government had set an export target of 1.3 million tonnes but only 400,000 tonnes could be exported when the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the cabinet suspended exports on May 23 as flour prices started to go up on massive buying by those having storage facilities and the Sindh government cried over its inability to meet its procurement target. About 20,000 tonnes of wheat could be exported to India for which duty- and tax-free exports were earlier allowed by the ECC on May 3.

With about two million tonnes of surplus stocks, notwithstanding in the public or private hands, the speculators and hoarders are going to lose at all costs because export ban would remain in place at least for another six-seven months as their storage cost and credit ceiling would hurt them, another senior government official said.