Potential Investment Areas

Value Added Products

• Processing of cereals to High-value products like snacks, ready to cook/ ready to eat products, bakery products

• Opportunity for millet-based value-added products

Super Cereals

• Share of healthy variants of cereals based products such as multi grain flour, brown bread, brown rice, multigrain bread, whole wheat bread are witnessing significant growth

• Super cereals or millets are witnessing a huge demand domestically and in global markets due to the health benefits that they offer

• India is not only one of the key producers of cereals globally, but also a major exporter.
• India's export of cereals stood at USD 6,074. Millions during the year 2016-17.
• Rice (including Basmati and Non-Basmati) occupy the major share in India's total cereals export with 95%. Other cereals, including wheat, represent only 5% share in total cereals exported from India.
• The huge demand for cereals in the global market is creating an excellent environment for the export of Indian cereal products.
• The key importers of India's basmati rice include Saudi Arabia, Iran, UAE, Iraq, Kuwait and USA.
• India is not only the largest producer of cereal as well as largest exporter of cereal products in the world. India's export of cereals stood at 6,611.09 USD Millions during the year 2019-20
• The Indian government’s support for both production and exports has contributed to the rapid growth in shipments, which are increasingly destined for developing nations including least-developed nations

Soaring Government Rice and Wheat Stocks Contribute to Record Exports

• The Indian government purchases rice and wheat directly from farmers at minimum support prices (MSPs). The MSPs for wheat and rice have increased significantly over the past six years, with rice up 75 per cent and wheat up 40 percent.
• Record-breaking food-grain production was registered in seven years in the past decade. From 217 million tonnes in 2006-07, the country’s production jumped to 275.11 million tonnes in 2016-17. Three years of drought, in 2009, 2014 and 2015, did not really bring production down.
• India’s production of wheat has broken records in recent years, while the country remains a major producer and the world’s biggest exporter of rice.
• Rice production in India in 2019-20 is put at 115 million tonnes, unrevised from the previous report and down from 116.4 million the year before. India is the world’s leading exporter of rice at a forecast 10.4 million tonnes for 2019-20, revised down from the previous month’s figure of 11.2 million and up from 9.9 million in 2018-19.
• India’s total grains imports in 2019-20 are put at an unrevised 700,000 tonnes, up from 300,000 the year before. Its total grains exports are put at an unrevised 1.1 million tonnes, compared with 1.2 million in 2018-19. Wheat imports are put at 100,000 tonnes, unrevised and with no figure given by the IGC for the previous year. Its exports of wheat are put at 400,000 tonnes, unrevised from a month earlier and down from 500,000 the year before.

India’s Exports Benefit from Government Policies and Subsidies

• One of the drivers behind India’s export growth has been the dramatic growth in government support provided to agriculture, particularly for wheat and rice. Based on official sources, FAS/New Delhi estimates that the Indian government’s total support for agriculture has grown from $68 billion in 2009/10 to $85 billion in 2013/14.
• Furthermore, the new government budget recently released indicates that support is likely to reach a new record high in 2014/.
• In addition to supporting irrigation, power, fertilizer, which boosts production for many exported crops such as cotton and sugar, the Indian government provides direct price support to wheat and rice, among other commodities. 

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