NOD TO INCREASE IN CANE PRICE
NEW DELHI: The Cabinet on Wednesday approved the fair and remunerative price (FRP) of sugarcane, the price at which millers buy from farmers, for 2020-21), increasing the minimum by ~10 to ~285 per quintal.
The sugarcane sale season will start in October 2020. The FRP, which is provided for by the Sugarcane (Control) Order, 1966, is the minimum price that sugar mills have to pay to sugarcane farmers.
Sugarcane producing states such as Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and Haryana fix their own sugarcane price called ‘state advisory prices’ (SAPS), which are usually higher than the Centre’s FRP.
According to government estimates, the country’s total sugar production is pegged to be 28-29 million tonne in the current year ending next month, compared to 33.1 million tonnes during 2018-19 due to a sharp fall in cane acreage in Maharashtra and Karnataka.
The FRP of ~285 per quintal applied for a basic recovery rate of 10%, which is the amount of sugar recovered from a given quantity of cane. A premium of ~2.85 per quintal for every 0.1% increase above 10% in the recovery has been allowed.
However, there will a reduction in FRP by ~2.85 per quintal for every 0.1 percentage point decrease in recovery in respect of those mills whose recovery is below 10% but above 9.5%.
However, for mills having recovery 9.5 % or below, the FRP is fixed at ~270.75 per quintal.
“#Cabinetdecision to set up National Recruitment Agency (NRA) to conduct Common Eligibility Test (CET) for preliminary selection to various Government vacancies is a revolutionary reform brought in by visionary intervention of PM @narendramodi,” minister for personnel, public grievances and pensions, Jitendra Singh, wrote on Twitter.
“This will bring ease of recruitment, ease of selection and thereby ease of living for aspirant candidates. It will provide level playing field, a great boon particularly for economically deprived who cannot afford travelling to multiple centres, youth in far flung areas with difficulty to reach different centres and women candidates who are unable to travel to different cities because of constraints of travel and stay,” he added.
“There are more than 20 recruitment agencies in the central government,” department of personnel and training secretary C Chandramouli said at a press conference. “Right now, we are bringing three agencies under the National Recruitment Agency and will eventually bring all of them under it.”