The underachievement of targets is a manifestation of an attempt by the ruling dispensation to artificially suppress the BE in order to show a better picture of the fiscal deficit. The Union government may end up spending Rs 50,000 crore more than the budget estimate (BE) on the three major subsidies — fertiliser, food and cooking gas — during the current financial year. The maximum slippage of Rs 25,000 crore would be in fertiliser subsidy where the revised estimate (RE) is likely to be Rs 2 lakh crore against a BE of Rs 1.75 lakh crore. Food subsidy will increase by Rs 15,000 crore with the RE rising to Rs 2.12 lakh crore against the BE of Rs 1.97 lakh crore....
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Category: Moneycontrol.com
More reforms are needed to attract serious investment in oil & gas
Measures taken by the government recently will remove some impediments holding back investment in exploration and production. Pricing and marketing of produce also need to be unshackled Despite offering an attractive policy environment under the New Exploration and Licensing Policy (NELP) and the Hydrocarbon Exploration and Licensing Policy (HELP), also known as the Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP), exploration and production (E&P) of oil and gas hasn’t picked up on the required scale. A major bottleneck has been regulatory hurdles which the government is now trying to address. Three important measures have been implemented by the Union government in recent times to remove regulatory and procedural hurdles faced by E&P companies. One, 0.67 million sq km sedimentary basin lying offshore,...
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The success of PM PRANAM depends on reducing urea usage by farmers
The government has rightly emphasised the need for shifting away from chemical fertilisers, reducing imbalance in nutrient use and rejuvenating the soil. But this won’t be possible till the existing policy framework is changed The announcements on urea perpetuate their use by emphatically stating that the extant pricing and subsidy policies will continue. The Union government made three major policy announcements on June 28, 2023 — continuation of the urea subsidy scheme up to 2025-26 with an outlay of Rs 3.68 lakh crore, continued availability of urea to the farmers at the maximum retail price of Rs 242 per 45 kg bag and a new scheme PM-PRANAM (PM programme for restoration, awareness, nourishment and amelioration of mother earth). The first...
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Farmers and industry suffer as pesticides regulations stay lax
Farmers and industry suffer as pesticides regulations stay lax Recent developments in regard to the banning of 27 pesticides including 12 insecticides have brought to the fore the Union government’s cavalier approach to dealing with safety issues connected with their use. Based on a review a total of 66 pesticides, which are banned in two or more other countries, continue to be registered for use in India, in May 2020 it banned 27 pesticides. Vide an order dated February 15, 2023, it has now removed the ban on 24 of these. As for the remaining three, pesticide companies are not making them. Another disquieting development is the inordinate delay in enacting the Pesticides Management Bill to replace the Insecticides Act of...
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Has the government shelved reforms in gas pricing?
The revision of the gas pricing formula is in line with the recommendations of the Kirit Parikh committee but the government is silent on deregulating prices from 2027 The shift to link the price of natural gas with the crude oil price is unwarranted as natural gas is not a replacement for crude oil. The government made two significant changes in the revised pricing policy for domestic natural gas produced from legacy fields. One, it linked the price of natural gas to the basket of Indian crude oil instead gas prices at global hubs. Two, it introduced the concept of a price band. Legacy fields are nomination fields, blocks given under New Exploration Licensing Policy (NELP) and pre-NELP blocks. It...
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Administrative measures can’t curb misuse of fertiliser subsidies
Routing the subsidy through manufacturers and keeping the selling price of fertilisers artificially low, makes diversion of subsidised fertilisers profitable for dubious players The availability of fertilisers at an ‘artificially’ low price is very tempting to all stakeholders in the supply chain. (File image) About 41 percent of fertiliser subsidy is diverted to non-agricultural uses including smuggling to neighbouring countries, 24 percent is consumed by larger farmers and another 24 percent is spent on inefficient producers, the Economic Survey 2015-16 noted. That essentially means that just about 11 percent of the subsidy goes to small and medium farmers. The Union government subsidises fertiliser sales to keep input costs low for farmers. Diversion to purposes other than farming is a misuse...
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Fertiliser Subsidy: Scrap pricing scheme and decontrol urea
Bureaucrats are micro-managing the operations of urea plants through the New Pricing Scheme. This is the surest way to scuttle any initiative to cut costs and improve efficiency The genesis of NPS lies in the Union government asking manufacturers to sell urea to farmers at a low ‘uniform’ price. (Representative Image) In the context of the debate over increasing fertiliser subsidy, a major issue that often escapes public attention is the New Pricing Scheme (NPS) for urea. The genesis of NPS lies in the Union government asking manufacturers to sell urea to farmers at a low ‘uniform’ price unrelated to the cost of production and distribution, which is higher, and its promise to reimburse them the differential amount as a subsidy....
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Banish those thoughts of LPG subsidy ending in the near term
LPG subsidy is here to stay notwithstanding proclamations by successive governments to end it. This is because actions on the ground are driven by populism, not economics Subsidy on LPG is the excess of its cost of supply over the price paid by the beneficiary. (Representative image) In the Union Budget for 2023-24, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman has kept the budget estimate (BE) for petroleum subsidy – primarily subsidy on liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) for household consumption – for 2023-24 at a mere Rs 2,257 crore. The subsidy on the purchase of a product is a financial assistance given by the state to persons who cannot afford to pay the market-based or cost-plus price. Subsidy on LPG is the excess...
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Levy 5% GST on natural gas to reduce fertiliser subsidy
Bringing natural gas under GST can end the extant differential taxation regime/varying urea cost and subsidy payments across states. It will eliminate the cascading effect of tax on tax Fertilisers attract GST at the rate of 5 percent. This together with low MRP results in a scenario where output tax liability is insufficient to offset taxes paid on inputs such as natural gas. Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman has said that the tax rate for five petroleum goods – crude oil, natural gas, petrol, diesel and aviation turbine fuel (ATF) – can be fixed under the Goods and Services Tax (GST) as soon as the states give their consent at a GST Council meeting. GST is a ‘single tax’ applied all...
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Cap natural gas prices to control rising fertiliser subsidy
The government should continue with the extant formula for the pricing of natural gas as per November 2014 guidelines The pricing of domestic gas presents a mix of administrative control and market forces. A major reason why fertiliser subsidy zoomed to Rs 2.25 lakh crore in the revised estimate (RE) of 2022-23 against the budget estimate (BE) of Rs 1.05 lakh crore was the sharp increase in the price of natural gas, which accounts for over 80 percent of the production cost of urea. Almost all manufacturing of urea in India is based on natural gas. India consumes 59.5 billion cubic metres (bcm) of natural gas annually. Of this, nearly 54 percent, or 32.13 bcm, is produced domestically, and...
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