New Delhi [India], June 1 (ANI): The government has so far procured 262 lakh tonne of wheat. It has already surpassed last year's total procurement of 188 LMT by 74 lakh tonnes.

The crop marketing season ends in June.

About 21.27 lakh farmers have already benefitted from the ongoing wheat procurement operations with Minimum Support Price (MSP) worth Rs 47,000 crores.

Major contribution in the procurement has come from three procuring states of Punjab, Madhya Pradesh, and Haryana with procurement of 121.27 lakh tonne, 70.98 lakh tonne and 63.17 lakh tonne, respectively.

"The major contributing factors in healthy procurement this year has been the grant of relaxation by the Government of India in quality specifications of wheat affected due to untimely rains; the opening of procurement centres at village/ panchayat level; carrying out procurement through Co-operative Societies/ Gram Panchayats/ Arhatias etc. in addition to designated procurement centres for better outreach and permission to engage FPOs for procurement operations," an official release from food department said Thursday.

The rice procurement is also progressing smoothly. A quantity of 385 lakh tonne of rice has been procured, with another 110 lakh tonne yet to be procured.

Further, a quantity of 106 lakh tonnes of rice has been estimated to be procured from the rabi crop.

India has three cropping seasons -- summer, kharif, and rabi.

Crops that are sown during October and November and the produce harvested from January-March depending on maturity is Rabi. Crops sown during June-July and harvested in October-November are kharif. Crops produced between rabi and kharif are summer crops.

The release also said the combined stock position of wheat and rice in the central pool is currently over 579 lakh tonne (wheat 312 lakh tonne and rice 267 lakh tonne). It places the country in a comfortable position to meet its requirements of food grains. (ANI)