India says rice, wheat stocks adequate and growing

By Mayank Bhardwaj

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India has bought adequate quantity of rice and wheat from the local market and stocks of the staples will swell further, the head of the biggest official procurement agency said on Friday.

India, which imported wheat in the past two years, has banned exports of wheat and severely curtailed sales of rice to shore up domestic supplies and tame inflation, which has soared to a 3-1/2-year high and officials now say the granaries are brimming, ruling out imports.

"As of today, 15.4 million tonnes of wheat has been procured for the central pool," Alok Sinha, chairman and managing director of Food Corp, told a news conference.

"It is expected that we may mop up 17.5 million tonnes wheat," he said.

He said India was likely to exceed its target of buying 27 million tonnes of rice in the marketing year to September and had already purchased 23.2 million tonnes so far this year, which is 1.8 million tonnes more than the same period a year ago.

India's bulging rice stocks offer no comfort to countries that face shortfalls.

Export curbs such as those in India and Vietnam have spooked importers like the Philippines and Bangladesh at a time when global stocks have halved from a record high in 2001.

An official from Thailand, the world's biggest rice exporter, said producers were also facing higher costs as prices of inputs like fertilisers had risen.