Gujarat government informed that in the past four months, total 25,59,696 quintal of cotton (approx 1.5 million bales of 170 kg each) have been procured by Cotton Corporation of India (CCI). This, according to traders, is much less for the largest producer of the fibre crop.
In the past four months, the state government had represented three times to the centre seeking intervention to provide remunerative prices to the cotton farmers. As on February 9, the centre has assisted Gujarat by setting up 65 procurement centres in the State, through which CCI has procured 25,59,696 quintal kapas, the government said.
However, trader sources revealed that the procurement was not enough for a state like Gujarat, which grows about 30 per cent of the country’s cotton. As per market sources, cotton procurement by CCI from other States was higher because of the superior quality and length of the fibre.
Cotton from South India fetch better price at auction because of its fibre length of about 30-31 mm. Whereas in Gujarat, widely grown Shankar-6 has the fibre length of 28-29 mm. CCI auctions are on and daily around 25,000 bales are traded on e-auctions, a leading cotton exporter from Ahmedabad said.