LAHORE, Sept 19: Punjab needs a million tons of wheat to improve its operational reserves and strategic stocks and the federal government may soon place an order for meeting the need.

Punjab food department sources said that a summary to this effect would soon be sent to the provincial chief executive, who would approach the federal government. The order will be in addition to the import of 1.5 million tons, a decision for which has already been taken.

Punjab has 2.5 million tons of wheat in its stocks - 2.45 million tons from the season's procurement and 50,000 tons carryover. The requirement of the province is 2.7 million to 2.8 million tons and it faces a shortfall of 200,000 to 300,000 tons.

The new demand was meant to meet the shortfall and start the new season with a carryover of 200,000 tons to cope with any pitfalls during the next year's procurement, the sources said.

The expected water shortage in the coming Rabi season had put a question mark on the next year's yield and procurement, they said. Punjab would need another 500,000 tons for keeping strategic reserves, so its total demand would be of around a million tons, the sources said.

They said there was no ban on wheat movement but the department had the authority to keep a watch in this regard. It had asked the licence holders to declare their stocks so that it could assess the situation, they said.

The department might soon end the official procurement drive, they said. They said the role of the private sector would be regulated next year. Punjab wanted to regulate it according to the ground realities but the federal government was under pressure from the donor agencies to leave the procurement process and let the private sector handle purchases, they said.

The Asian Development Bank was holding back the second tranche of its ASPL-II loan and putting pressure on the government to get out of procurement, they said. "The bank is encouraging trade but asking the government not to take steps for increasing production," they claimed.

All efforts of the donors were riveted on trade and procurement of wheat whereas the crisis was that of production, they said. They said efforts should be concentrated on improving per acre yield and increasing production of wheat, which was a matter of food security but the donors were only looking at the trade side.

They said Punjab would continue monitoring the situation and act accordingly. They said the situation had started easing with the arrival of Russian wheat. Around 100,000 tons of wheat would arrive every week for 15 weeks, they said. The sources said apprehensions about the quality of the Russian wheat were in the air and things might not turn out to be as rosy as they looked.