Indian Food Corporation of India (FCI) is going to raise short-term loans of Rs 50,000 crore from different scheduled banks of the country for a period of three months. A senior government official gave this information on Monday. It also includes a ‘green shoe’ option to raise an additional Rs 25,000 crore. These funds are being raised to handle the cash flow imbalance arising from procurement and distribution of food grains. The tenders submitted in this regard will be opened on May 22. The official said the total borrowing under the tender will not exceed Rs 75,000 crore at any time.
Loan distribution will be done in different phases as per the operational requirements of FCI.
This short-term loan will be taken on the basis of no security. It is noteworthy that the Government of India guarantee of Rs 6,000 crore available to FCI for food loans will not be applicable on these borrowings. As per the terms of the tender, the offers should be valid till August 31 and the loan disbursement will be done in phases as per the operational requirements of FCI. Let us tell you that Food Corporation of India is the nodal agency of the government involved in the procurement and distribution of food grains to ration card holders and beneficiaries of welfare schemes.
The government has set a target of purchasing 3.449 crore tonnes of wheat for 2026-27.
Food Corporation of India is currently organizing an active wheat procurement season. In the current marketing season 2026-27 (March–April), FCI and state agencies have so far procured a total of 22.97 crore tonnes of wheat from farmers at the Minimum Support Price (MSP). Punjab is at the forefront in this purchase with 1.051 crore tonnes. In this list, after Punjab, Madhya Pradesh is at second place (67.2 lakh tonnes), Haryana is at third place (25.8 lakh tonnes) and Rajasthan is at fourth place (17.7 lakh tonnes). The central government has set the wheat procurement target for 2026-27 at 34.49 crore tonnes.
