The government should not abruptly change its policy and it should not have banned the trading in wheat, rice and other crops, which was benefiting a large number of farmers, according to prominent farmer representatives.
They strongly urged that the futures? trading in wheat and pulses should start without any delay because the new harvesting season of wheat is going to arrive in next few months. The government must have realised by now that the ban on futures? trading has not stopped rise in wheat prices, which are governed by demand and supply situation in the country.
The Forward Markets Commission (FMC) on Tuesday convened a meeting of farmers? organisations and at Mumbai to apprise them of the latest developments in the commodity futures market and to have their views on farmers? participation in the market.
The meeting was jointly organised by the FMC and the National Commodity Exchanges and was presided over by BC Khatua, chairman, FMC.
The meeting was attended by around 25 representatives of prominent farmers? organisations. The representatives of various farmers? organisations such as Shetkari Sangathan (Sharad Joshi), Kisan Coordination Committee (Bhupinder Singh Mann), Bhatiya Kisan Union (Ratan Singh Mann), Federation of Farmers Association, Kisan Jagriti Mandal (Sudhir Panwar) and Karnataka Pradesh Red Gram Growers Association participated in the discussion and expressed their views.
The participants expressed concerns about poor marketing infrastructures available to the farmers.
They also highlighted the extremely poor share the farmer gets in the whole value chain.