Participation of traders in the ongoing auctions improved both in the Southern Light Soil (SLS) and Southern Black Soil (SBS) auction platforms in Prakasam district on Wednesday.
The increased participation came in the wake of Agriculture Minister P. Pulla Rao visiting the Ongole II auction platform recently and giving a stern warning to traders keeping away, and asking the Tobacco Board to suspend auctions if needed to rein in the erring traders. However, there is no considerable increase in the prices offered by them, SBS Regional Manager G. Bhaskara Reddy has said.
He rules out any further fall in the market prices for various categories of tobacco.
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After a good start in March, when the price of bright grade tobacco went up to Rs. 150 per kg, the market turned bearish after the manufacturers stopped production of cigarettes in the wake of the Union Health Ministry bringing into force larger pictorial warning from April 1. The rejections, which till recently had been of the order of 20-30 per cent, came down to 10 per cent, said SLS Regional Manager G. Ratnasagar. Like last year, there have been no takers for the dark green variety of tobacco, putting the farmers to trouble.
“The number of bales offered for sale by the farmers will be increased from the present 3,800 to 5,000 from next week,” Mr Reddy said, adding that “we plan to facilitate trading of 0.50-0.70 million kg of tobacco each day in the coming weeks.”
The farmers marketed 14.50 million kg at an average price of Rs. 125.98 per kg in the SLS auction platforms and 12.38 million kg at an average rate of Rs. 123.32 per kg in the SBS auction platforms.
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