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Don’t hoard DAP, says Punjab agri minister Nabha
Nabha says strict action will be initiated against the dealers and state’s agricultural cooperative societies found indulging in hoarding and black-marketing of the DAP
Owing to acute shortage of di-ammonia phosphate (DAP) in the state, Punjab agriculture minister Randeep Singh Nabha on Saturday said strict action will be initiated against the dealers and state’s agricultural cooperative societies found indulging in hoarding and black-marketing of the agro-fertiliser.
The DAP is a key input used as a basal dose for the rabi crop particularly wheat and these days farmers are sowing the crop, for which the ideal time is up to November 15.
“We need a total of 5.5 lakh tonne of DAP for the entire rabi season out of which 4.8 lakh tonne is required for wheat crop,” said an officer of the state agriculture department, adding that so far 1.72 lakh tonne has been sold to farmers and remaining goes pending. Currently, the state has 67,000 lakh tonne in the stocks.
“Licence of retailers and cooperative societies will be cancelled if found indulging in malpractices,” said Nabha, hinting of action against some the retailers found indulging in malpractice.
Nabha said 50 rakes of the DAP of have been promised by the Centre, which will add up 1.5 lakh tonne to the stocks.
“About 1.5 lakh tonne DAP is deficient this year as compared to previous year during same period. Out government is trying its best to arrange adequate stocks of DAP,” added the minister, attributing shortage to increase in the DAP prices globally. He appealed to retailers, cooperative societies and the individual farmers not to hoard DAP as it will lead to panic buying.
