As the lockdown in China is lifted, the boom in the commodity sector is booming

- Commodity Current : Jayavadan Gandhi

- Year 2023 declared as International Year of Cereals

With more than 70 countries supporting the proposal of the Government of India to celebrate the next New Year 2023 as the International Year of Nutrition, the United Nations General Assembly declared the year 2023 as the International Year of Cereals, and now the government has undertaken an exercise to promote the cultivation of cereals on a large scale. India produces many cereal crops including wheat, jowar, bajri, ragi, maize. India's contribution to the production of food grains in Asia is more than 80 percent. In the last four-five years, the production of major grains has been steadily increasing. In the year 2015-16, the country produced around 145.2 lakh tonnes, in the year 2017-18 164.4 lakh tonnes, in the year 2019-20 172.6 lakh tonnes and in the last year 2020-22 around 179.60 lakh tonnes. 4 million dollars worth of major grains were exported, with a continuous increase, the export increased to a level above 2.6 million dollars in 2020. After the Russia-Ukraine war, there was a severe shortage of wheat in many countries of the world, having serious effects on the supply of various crops including grain from both countries. Under these circumstances, India supplied a large quantity of wheat to the world. Finally, India imposed a ban on the export of wheat due to the fear of wheat shortage at the internal level in the country. However, in the new rabi season, there has been an increase in the area of ​​over two and a half lakh hectares with a jump of 25 percent in wheat cultivation. Due to which various organizations have recently demanded to remove the ban on wheat export and to control the import of products imported at prices below the support price.

In the state too, more than fifty percent of wheat cultivation has been completed. This year wheat has been sown in an area of ​​more than 28 lakh hectares. If the government relaxes exports, the market is more likely to increase during the wheat season. With the eyes of the whole world on Indian wheat, the demand for wheat remains strong this year and the farmers are also expected to get high prices. Along with wheat, gram cultivation has been bumper to 7.75 lakh hectares. Along with this, there has been a rise of 10 to 15 percent in the cultivation of isabgol and fennel. However, despite skyrocketing cumin prices, planting is noticeably slow. The cumin crop is likely to be affected due to the possibility of monsoon in the state in the coming weeks. The rains especially in December and January can cause heavy damage to the cumin crop. Due to which the cumin market is currently heating up. In the cumin futures market, traders remained on a wait-and-watch basis as prices rose to Rs 265 per kg last week. Finally, cumin futures were around 262. Gwar is likely to produce more than one crore sacks this year.

Meanwhile, there is a flash of boom in metal, crude oil and some agricultural commodities, which are starting to relax in the lockdown in China. As China's demand is high in many things like aluminium, coal, cotton, soybeans, crude oil, copper, the commodity sector is likely to witness a boom in the near future.