January 13, 2009
India corn futures gains on state purchases
India's corn futures rose sharply on Monday (Jan 12) as the government increased its corn purchases to prevent prices from declining below the state-set minimum support price (MSP), said analysts.
The Food Corporation of India and state agencies bought corn aggressively in spot to prevent the price from falling below the set Rs840 per 100kg, said traders and analysts.
Weak corn demand in India and worldwide has lowered prices and it is up to the government to prevent prices from crashing, said a trader based in Nizamabad, a major trading hub.
Prices have been falling for the past three months as a fall in local demand due to a bird flu outbreak coincides with the global economic slowdown, analysts said.
The most-active May corn NMZK9 on the National Commodity and Derivatives Exchange ended at Rs824.5 per 100, down 0.18 percent. The contract had hit a high of Rs871 earlier in the session.
Despite the positives, profit-taking late in the session had eroded the gains, said analysts.
US$1 = Rs48.6381 (Jan 13)
