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To contain commodity prices, consumer affairs ministry formulates plan
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Wednesday, 24 December, 2014, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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Our Bureau, New Delhi
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fiogf49gjkf0d In its year-end review for 2014, the ministry of consumer affairs, food and public distribution noted that in the last seven months, it had formulated an integrated action plan to contain the prices of essential commodities; put in place a mechanism for the online tracking of foodgrain procurement and distribution to make it more efficient, and drafted major amendments in the Consumer Protection Act to empower consumers.
These initiatives had a direct positive bearing on the common man. Food inflation decreased to zero per cent at the end of second week of this month. The adequate and timely availability of foodgrains was possible in the remotest areas despite natural calamities like Cyclone Hudhud in Andhra Pradesh; floods in Jammu and Kashmir, and disruption in the major rail route due to gauge conversion in the North-East.
New experiments, such as shipping of foodgrains to Tripura, were undertaken for this purpose. Consumer complaint redressal was just a phone call away with the integration of the consumer helpline system.
The sugarcane arrears, which were Rs 14,095 crore as on May 31, 2014, came down to Rs 3,567 crore on December 15, 2014 as a result of the concerted efforts to facilitate the payment (6.12 per cent of the total payable sugarcane price of Rs 58,269.63 crore) to the farmers for the 2013-14 sugar season.
The payment of sugarcane arrears to the farmers by the mills was a matter of great concern for the government, which took various measures to facilitate the payment of the arrears to the farmers, which included interest-free loans, export subsidies on raw sugar and other incentives to the sugar sector.
Steps to contain prices of essential food items
In view of the weak monsoon in some parts of the country, an increase was noticed in the prices of some of the essential commodities. The ministry of consumer affairs, food and public distribution acted swiftly, and a conference of state food ministers was convened on to plan both long- and short-term strategies to contain the prices.
Onions and potatoes were declared essential commodities, so that the stock control orders could be issued and anti-hoarding measures could be taken by the states. The futures trading in rice was suspended and the stock limit was imposed on paddy and rice until November 2014, until the arrival of the new crop to ensure the easy availability of essential commodities at reasonable prices.
The states advised to allow free movement of fruit and vegetables by delisting them from the Agricultural Produce Market Committee (APMC) Act, so that the farmers could have a wider selling choice, and consumers could avail at cheaper prices.
Moreover, to overcome the situation of scarcity of some food and vegetables in one part of the country and excess supply in another, a decision was taken to develop a common national market by removing all barriers on inter-state trade.
The government also decided to create a market intervention fund for the direct intervention in case of an unreasonable increase in the prices of food items.
The ministry’s price monitoring cell, which monitors the prices of 22 essential commodities strengthened further by increasing the number of reporting centres from 57 to 64 and improving the reporting mechanism. And the states were asked to set up their own price monitoring units to supplement the Centre’s efforts.
In order to moderate the prices of wheat and rice, the release of 100 lakh tonnes of wheat from the Food Corporation of India (FCI) stock for open market was approved. Fifty lakh tonnes of additional rice was also released through the public distribution system (PDS) with this objective.
The ministry also decided to make hoarding a non-bailable offence and increase the period of detention for black marketing of essential commodities by amending the Essential Commodities Act, 1955 and the Prevention of Black Marketing and Maintenance of Supplies of Essential Commodities Act, 1980.
Improving foodgrain mgt
A high-level committee of experts under the chairmanship of Member of Parliament Shanta Kumar, set up to recommend the restructuring of FCI for improving foodgrains management in the country, efficient minimum support price (MSP) operations, scientific storage and strengthening the supply chain.
Extensive consultations with stakeholders and states are underway. The committee is expected to submit its report next month.
Meanwhile, the computerisation of FCI operations is being taken in a big way. The online depot system is an initiative to bring operations of all godowns online in a time-bound manner to check reported leakage.
To modernise storage decision taken to build modern silos and eleven sites identified for such silos. The storage capacity also augmented by completing 120.67 lakh metric tonnes capacity by October 2014, of the 200 lakh metric tonne-capacity approved under the public private partnership (PPP) model.
In order to benefit more farmers by improving outreach of MSP operations, the government-decided limit the levy of rice on millers upto 25 per cent.
Implementation of the National Food Security Act remained priority of the government. It remained in touch with the states to ensure its speedy implementation. Eleven states have implemented the Act, while the remaining 25 states have also committed for early implementations.
In a recent meeting of state food secretaries state-wise reviews were held to see the preparedness.
They were asked to make the PDS totally transparent by adopting end-to-end computerisation. They have been advised to list the beneficiaries on the Web portal, display the movement of ration, and all the related information, digitise ration cards and seed them with Aadhaar.
Meanwhile, the Centre continued timely allocation of foodgrains to the states which are yet to implement the National Food Security Act.
During the current year, the ministry released additional 66.45 lakh tonnes of foodgrains to these states for distribution at the below poverty line (BPL) and above poverty line (APL) rates.
These states were also allocated 7.11 lakh tonnes of foodgrains for festivals and calamity relief. This was in addition to the provisional allotment of 483.30 lakh tonnes of foodgrains already made to the states under the normal targeted public distribution system (TPDS) allocation, including the allocation under the National Food Security Act.
Swift actions ensured adequate supplies of foodgrains during natural calamities.
FCI supplied 16,500 10kg packets of rice for distribution in the far-flung areas of the flood-affected northern state on the request of the state government.
Similarly in the North-Eastern states, despite the disruption in the rail route due to gauge conversion from Lumding to Badarpur, adequate availability of foodgrains was ensured, and for the first time, rice was shipped from Andhra Pradesh to Tripura through Bangladesh’s waterways in October 2014 for this purpose.
Empowering consumers
Amendments proposed in the Consumer Protection Act and the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) Act, 1986, for greater empowerment of consumers.
Provisions made to ensure speedy, inexpensive and simple dispensation of justice for the consumers.
A decision was taken to set up the National Consumer Protection Authority with all the executive and enforcement powers for the redressal of consumer grievances and to take penal class action against defaulting companies.
In order to ensure quality product and services for consumers, amendments also proposed in the Bureau of Indian Standards Act, 1986.
The provisions for the recall of products, enhancement of the financial penalty and reduction of the long process of litigation proposed.
The decision was also made to include more products and services for mandatory standards certification. The simplified scheme of self-declaration of conformity also proposed for helping industries to conform to the ISI Standards.
Under the Swacch Bharat Abhiyan, steps were taken to formulate/upgrade the standards for potable water, street food and garbage disposal.
Consultations were held at the national level to take the views of all stakeholders on the proposed amendments to the Consumer Protection Act in New Delhi, and on BIS Act.
To tackle the menace of misleading advertisements, the department of consumer affairs set up an inter-ministerial committee.
Grahak Suvidha Kendras (consumer care centres) have been planned across the country. These centres will serve as a single-window facility for consumers to get their grievances redressed with facilities of counselling and mediation.
The trained officials manning these centres would not only provide pre-purchase advice, but also take up the grievance of the consumers with concern to resolve on priority.
The existing consumer grievance redressal mechanism was also strengthened by integrating facilities provided by the National Consumer Helpline and Consumer Online Resource & Empowerment Centre (CORE).
The inter-ministerial committee, set up to see how the interests of consumers can be protected in the era of direct marketing of goods. Its first meeting was held recently.
The application format for the grant of grants from the Consumer Welfare Fund digitised and improved for greater transparency.
Joint campaigns organised with health, financial services and other departments for greater consumer awareness. Financial assistance was released to the state governments for strengthening consumer courts and testing laboratories under the Legal Metrology Act.
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