Wheat Flour Refined Wheat Flour And Samolina Export Policy Amended

DGFT (Directorate general of foreign trade) has issued a fresh notification amending the export policy of wheat flour, refined wheat flour (Maida), Samolina (sooji), Wholemeal atta and Resultant atta. This notification dated 8^th August 2022 is extension of a previous notification issued on 6^th July 2022 amending wheat flour export policy. This fresh notification is not restricting the export of any commodity just like 6^th July notification. Export of all commodities mentioned in the 8^th August notification will be free even after the notification comes into force on 14^th of August 2022. So, exporters of wheat flour (atta), Sooji (Samolina / Rawa / Sirgi), Maida (refined wheat flour), Wholemeal atta and Resultant atta, don’t need to worry.

Government of India has taken many steps to reign in prices of wheat and wheat flour in domestic market starting with limited ban of wheat exports that is still in place. Wheat export was banned from Indian shores effective from 13^th May 2022 but some exceptions were made. Considerable quantities of wheat outflows happened by virtue of exceptions. Wheat Exporters found a novel way of bypassing wheat export ban imposed by GOI and started converting their wheat stocks into wheat flour stocks to export. In the aftermath of wheat export ban sudden surge in wheat flour exports was observed and alarmed by this GOI amended wheat flour export policy. New policy was not at all harsh on wheat flour exporters and wheat flour exports carried on in full swing. New amendment to export policy of wheat flour, refined wheat flour (Maida), Samolina (sooji), Wholemeal atta and Resultant atta through 8^th August notification is also not at all harsh on exporters and will not impede exports. Maida, Sooji and atta exporters can keep their export operations on without worrying; both online exporters and exporters exporting the traditional way needn’t worry. Major part of agro commodities exports happens online nowadays through B2B ecommerce platforms and hence deserved a mention. When agro commodities exports on ecommerce platforms became too rampant some experts developed the concept of B2B ecommerce platform dedicated to agro commodities. Pioneer in development and mainstreaming of this concept is Tradologie next generation B2B ecommerce marketplace.

New Export Policy Keeps Export Of Wheat Flour, Refined Wheat Flour And Samolina Free

Has this notification (8^th August notification) restricted wheat flour, Samolina or refined wheat flour outflows in any way? Answer is a big no. Then, how on earth can be this particular export policy amendment called harsh? What’s the impact basically? Export of Sooji, Maida, wholemeal atta, resultant atta and wheat flour can’t be exported without the recommendation of inter-ministerial committee on wheat export. So, exporters have to just get recommendation of the said committee and export.

Exceptions

As the notification will come into force on 14^th of August, Maida and Samolina consignments whose loading started before the issue of notification can be exported between 8^th and 14^th August. If before the issuance of notification, any such consignment has been already handed over to the customs and registered in their system then the consignment can be exported between 8^th and 14^th August.

Conclusion

This new amendment to export policy was necessary to stave away any possibility of shortage of wheat and wheat derivatives in domestic market in light of record low procurement by FCI this Rabi marketing season (RMS). Procurement this RMS has fallen below the mark of 200 LMT. Procurement from key wheat producing states has more than halved. Procurements from UP and Rajasthan has been precarious. Only exception has been Punjab but procurement from Punjab has also fallen drastically.