ISLAMABAD: The Eco­no­mic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the Cabinet scheduled to meet on Monday will formally endorse the government’s decision to keep unchanged the wheat support price for 2015-16 crop at Rs1,300 per 40kg, official sources said.

The Ministry of National Food Security and Research has moved a summary to the ECC suggesting that there is no justification for revising the minimum guaranteed price of wheat for the year 2015-16 since the prices of wheat on the international market would continue to remain depressed, and Pakis­tan has currently wheat stock of around 8.168m tonnes.

According to sources, the ECC is likely to approve a strategy for the export of surplus wheat to create physical and fiscal space for the new crop.

The Federal Committee on Agriculture at its meeting last month had fixed the whe­at production target for 2015-16 crop at 26m tonnes from an area of 8.980m hectares.

In its summary for ECC, the ministry maintained that the world wheat production would rise to 721m tonnes in 2014-15 from 655 million tonnes in 2012-13, and the world wheat stocks are predicted to increase to 201 million tonnes in 2014-15 from 170m tonnes in 2012-13 which means that the prices of wheat in international market would continue to be depressed.

Published in Dawn, November 29th, 2015