Centre in overdrive to cool edible oil prices

The Modi government is feeling the heat of rising prices of edible oil in the midst of the festive season and has launched an overdrive to ensure that the steps taken to cool down prices reach the common man.

Over the past few weeks, the Centre has imposed stock limits, slashed import duty and banned futures trading on mustard to arrest the rising prices of the kitchen essential.

In the three days, the Centre has written to the states twice asking them to impose stock limits to ensure availability of edible oils during the ongoing festive season and called a meeting of state officials on Monday to review the situation.

On Friday, the Union Food Ministry wrote to all state governments suggesting them to impose stock limits in such a way that no stakeholder (refiners, millers, wholesalers, etc) holds the stock in excess of two months of their storage capacity.

For instance, during 2008-18, Rajasthan had imposed a stock limit of 10 quintals on retailers and 100 quintals on wholesalers, while Gujarat had imposed a stock limit of 45 quintals on retailers and 600 quintals on wholesalers in the same period, the letter said.

On Friday, the average retail price of mustard oil was ruling at Rs 185.55 per kg, groundnut oil at Rs 182.86 per kg, sunflower oil at Rs 168.21 per kg, soya oil at Rs 154.91 per kg, vanaspati at Rs 138.31 per kg and palm oil at Rs 132.64 per kg.

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