Fears of lockdown push Mumbaikars to stock up

Household consumers from Mumbai have started stocking up on their daily essentials and staple foodgrains like pulses, aata and rice from Sunday, when chief minister Uddhav Thackeray hinted at tightening measures if people did not adopt Covid-appropriate behaviour.

Ecommerce platforms have already doubled their stocking for a fortnight foreseeing a demand spurt due to rising Covid cases in Maharashtra while stockists have also become active, trade sources said. “After the chief minister addressed people about the rising number of infections in the state on Sunday, we have observed 15% to 20% increase in demand for foodgrains in Mumbai,” said Nilesh Veera, director (grains trade) at APMC, Vashi.

Veera said that almost all the ecommerce companies and modern retail chains operating in Maharashtra have taken a position and have doubled their purchases since a fortnight.


“The footfalls of the household customers, who visit the wholesale markets only on Sunday, have suddenly increased since Monday. Although, we do not foresee any disruption in supplies like the first lockdown, we have started ensuring that our warehouses have enough stocks to meet any increase in demand,” said Veera.

According to trade sources, during the nationwide lockdown imposed in the country in March-April 2020, consumers had stocked two to three times their normal requirement of staples and food grains, which led to a period of couple of months of subdued demand for food grains after lockdown restrictions were eased.

Stockists had already become active in the market due to shortage of some commodities like pulses and soyabean. Increased demand from retail customers has supported the stockists’ activity, said traders. Wherever the Covid cases have increased, traders have observed localised increase in consumer buying of food staples.

“One week before government announced a lockdown, we had seen an increase in demand from consumers, which eased after the lockdown started,” said Nikhil Agrawal, a pulses processor from Akola.