Sukhmeet Bhasin
Tribune News Service
Bathinda, October 16
The “white gold” is paying dividends to cotton growers in the state as private players have started purchasing the produce way above than the Minimum Support Price (MSP) fixed by the government this season.
Demand up at global level
- Experts claim the private players are buying cotton due to a sizable increase in the demand at the international level
- The companies are getting good rates internationally and are also learnt to be storing the stocks to sell later, expecting a rise in crop prices
- Competitive bidding is another reason for the high price
Farmers are fetching around Rs 8,000 per quintal, which is an all-time high price for the crop and is much higher than the MSP of Rs 6,025.
Jatinder Singh, secretary, Indian Cotton Association Limited, Bathinda, said: “The price of cotton is continuously on the rise and the main
reason is its huge demand and less supply.”
Experts claim the private players are buying cotton due to a sizable increase in the demand at the international level. They are getting good rates internationally and are also learnt to be storing the stocks to sell later, expecting a rise in prices.
Agricultural expert Dr Paramjit Singh Brar said the depleting stocks and increasing demand for cotton not only in India but also in countries like China and Bangladesh, which are international hubs of the textile sector, had led to the encouraging situation. “The reopening of textile industries, which were closed for a long time due to the pandemic, enhanced the demand for cotton supply,” he said. Competitive bidding among private players is another
reason for its high price.
The global prices of cotton have shot up since September in view of the consumption being higher than the production.
“There is good demand from spinning mills as yarn rates have also been leapfrogging. The gradual opening of markets in the US and Europe and increase in retail business has led to good demand for yarn exports from India,” Dr Brar said.
He said projections of lower output in the next cotton crop in major cotton-producing nations, including the US and Brazil, as farmers were planning to shift to maize and soybeans, which had given better returns, had also supported domestic prices.
Cotton windfall for farmers, sells at high of Rs 8K/quintal
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