Nafed to auction oilseeds, pulses through own platform, NCCF to follow suit

Union Cooperation Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday asked the National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation (Nafed) and the National Cooperative Consumers’ Federation (NCCF) to procure pulses and oilseeds directly from farmers so that maximum price benefit is passed on to the growers.

As India looks to reduce its dependence on imports of pulses and edible oils, the time has come for both Nafed and NCCF to procure pulses and oilseeds directly from farmers and get rid of middlemen, Shah said after launching Nafed’s digital auction platform Nafex.in, which will enable transparent auctioning of procured pulses and oilseeds. Nafed was previously using private platforms – mjunction, NEML, and e-tech for auctioning these procured commodities.

He said that though the output of pulses and oilseeds has risen in recent years, self-sufficiency remained elusive because minimum support prices (MSPs) were not reaching growers. He fixed a two-year deadline for Nafed and NCCF to pass on MSP benefits to farmers so that they are able to sell directly to these two cooperatives without intermediaries.

India currently imports 6-7 million tonnes (mt) of pulses and 15-16 mt of edible oils annually to bridge the gap between production and demand. Nafed and NCCF are the Centre’s nodal agencies to ensure oilseeds and pulses farmers get MSPs when market rates fall below the benchmark prices. NCCF plans to launch a similar auctioning platform.

Shah recalled that Nafed had hit a severe financial crisis in 2013 and needed government intervention to survive, which the NDA government extended through the price support scheme. Nafed’s annual turnover has surged to ₹30,000 crore in FY25 from ₹20,000 crore in 2019-20. The net profit is now ₹500 crore, with coverage of 76 lakh farmers. The minister suggested that Nafed target Rs 50,000 crore in turnover in the next two years.

Addressing the gathering, Union Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan called for self-reliance in pulses and oilseeds, claiming that the government was already procuring three varieties of pulses at remunerative prices.

Shah launched three more initiatives of Nafed. Drishti, a digital inventory management and ERP platform, along with a real-time data analysis tool, will ensure transparent stock management. The Nafed Kalyan Fund will support the children of farmers in their careers, for which the cooperative has decided to earmark 1 per cent of its profit. Nafed also moved to the Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system, an integrated software platform to manage and automate its core business operations.