Lukewarm response to wheat export tenders

NEW DELHI: The State-run trading companies such as MMTC , State Trading Corp (STC)and PEC, which have been exporting wheat from government warehouses, have got lukewarm response to tender floated for export of 1.60 lakh tonnes government wheat. With global prices weak, all bids received have been below the export floor price of $300 a tonne set by the government

According to government officials, STC which had come up with tender to offload 60,000 tonnes wheat from the Mundra got the highest bid from Singapore based trading company, Concordia which quoted $267 a tonne. Delhi headquartered Emmsons bid at $261.08 a tonne and Cargill at $253.00 a tonne.

The bids are invalid as the quotes were below the floor price of $300 a tonne set by the government.

With huge wheat stock in the central pool, the government has allowed export of 2 million tonnes wheat.As per the latest data, on September 16 the total grain stock with the central agency was 57.22 million tonnes. Wheat accounted to 37.48 million tonnes and rice at 19.74 million tonnes.

Also, the tender floated by MMTC to export 60,000 tonnes wheat got unsuccessful bids from Canada based Agrocorp at $261.25 a tonnes and Singapore based Starcom at $250 a tonne. The shipment was to go from the Kakinada port.

A similar fate was for PEC tender, which was for 40,000 tonnes wheat from the Kandla port. PEC received three bids from Singapore based Starcom at $248 a tonne, Emmsons at $260.08 a tonnes and Cargill at $253.00 a tonnes.