Russia may expand state grain intervention fund to 10 mln tns

MOSCOW, Mar 23 (PRIME) -- The Russian government is considering more than tripling the state fund for grain interventions to 10 million tonnes from 3 million tonnes, Deputy Prime Minister Viktoria Abramchenko told reporters on Thursday.

“We bought 3 million tonnes, but we see the carry-overs that our agricultural producers have, they exceed 30 million tonnes. We should look into the possibilities of our intervention fund as a pricing regulator on the grain market in the first place. We are considering expanding it by 7 million tonnes to 10 million tonnes,” she said.

The government will need to provide 11 billion rubles of additional financing this year to do that and allocate over 20 billion rubles to ensure grain procurements in 2024–2025. The authorities are discussing this with the Finance Ministry, but the additional money has not been approved yet, she said.

The government is also tracking the situation with the grain export duty after switching from the U.S. dollar prices to rubles. The indicative prices are comfortable for the market right now, Abramchenko said.

(76.9561 rubles – U.S. $1)

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