Mill on the Left can't grind wheat imports

NEW DELHI: The Centre’s decision to relax the conditions for wheat import has left the Left livid. It has termed it as yet another instance of the Manmohan Singh government buckling under US pressure.

The move, CPI national secretary D Raja charged, showed a bankruptcy in the government’s food policy. “It’s not clear whether it is being done in national interest, or on the WTO’s diktat,” he said.

The third round of tendering for the import of 2.2m tonnes of wheat saw as many as eight companies entering the fray. The contract for the commodity is likely to be awarded by the end of this month, and the firms in the running include American majors such as Cargill and Archer Daniels Midland, much to the dismay of the Left leaders.

The decision to relax the phyto-sanitary conditions, determined on the basis of the availability or non-availability of weeds, fungus and foreign materials, followed some intense lobbying by the Bush administration which demanded a level-playing field, alleging that the original conditions, framed by the NDA government in ‘03, were loaded heavily in favour of the Australians.

Fears of a severe depletion in the buffer stock of wheat had prompted the Manmohan Singh government to go in for wheat imports, with the total quantity pegged at 3.5m tonnes. The entire contract was valued at Rs 2,000 crore.

The norms for allowing imports were made so stringent that only the Australian Wheat Board, which finds its name in the Volcker committee report on the Iraqi oil-for-food programme, qualified for the first round of tender in February this year.

The norms were eased a bit for the second round of tender in May this year. This enabled Agricole, a European trading firm, to join the Australian Wheat Board in entering the fray for eight lakh tonnes of wheat.

Following some frenetic lobbying from the American establishment, with its ambassador in India mounting a determined campaign to facilitate a level-playing field for the non-Australian players, the Union Cabinet, in its meeting on June 2, decided to relax these conditions further for the import of an additional 2.2m tonnes of wheat.

The new conditions would mean that norms on the presence of weed, fungus and foreign elements in the imported wheat had been relaxed, allowing American and European companies to enter the bidding process. The bid may be finalised towards the end of this month, notwithstanding the reservations expressed by the Left.