TCP selects 31 ginning units for cotton buying

The government has selected 31 ginning factories in three provinces for procuring 310,000 bales of cotton (10,000 per factory) from the farmers, in addition to allocation of Rs 100 million to TCP as budgetary grant out of total credit line of Rs 1.18 billion, it is learnt.
The provincial agricultural teams have taken on board 22 factories from Punjab, 7 from Sindh and 2 from Balochistan, with two classers assigned to each factory, sources said.
They said that TCP would contract for whole production of a ginning factory, subject to a maximum of 10,000 bales, and the premium to the suppliers/grower for supplying 4,185,000 maunds of cotton to produce 310,000 bales of cotton worked out to Rs 209.25 million, @ Rs 50 per maund to the ginners.
However, the Ministry of Textile Industry was of the view that actual expenditure would be less as all 4,185,000 maunds might not be according to the laid down requirements, which means that the expenditure would not be as assessed, sources added.
They said the decision to procure 310,000 bales was based on the recommendations of the subcommittee constituted by Ministers' Committee under Secretary, Textile Industry.
The projected expenditure has been re-calculated at Rs 3.408 billion, against Rs 3.808 billion as per the formula applied for procurement of 100,000 bales which also includes TCP incidentals of Rs 225 per maund and premium for growers to Rs 50/maund on seed-cotton.
Sources said that premium for provision of clean cotton would be paid directly to the grower/phuti supplier by TCP through crossed cheques through the concerned ginners under the supervision of the provisional agricultural department representative.
According to sources, price of clean seed-cotton would be settled by the seller and the buyer with which TCP would have no concern. However, the Corporation would enter into a contract with the ginner to produce lint from phutti.
They said that ginned cotton would be purchased by TCP if certified to have less than 2.5 gm contamination per bale by the technical team based on complete checking of 5 bales per lot of 100 bales.