The Food and Civil Supplies department has restructured the distribution of wheat received under the National Food Security Act (NFSA) as part of the State’s tide-over allocation. The directive is aimed at preventing any wastage of food grains within the public distribution system.

The reform is based on a report by the Commissioner of Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs. The previous guidelines mandated that the State’s entire tide-over wheat allocation be converted and distributed exclusively as wheat flour (atta). However, an assessment found that the volume of flour production began to exceed consumer demand. This triggered fears that the failure to properly manage the surplus could lead to the spoilage of wheat flour, and thereby force its diversion into cattle feed manufacturing.

The government approved the policy change to address the challenge. Priority will remain on converting wheat into flour to meet the established requirement under the tide-over category. The total requirement for wheat flour will be consolidated and calculated at the district level. Once the required stock is set aside for flour milling, the remaining grain will be distributed directly to beneficiaries as whole wheat.

Kerala’s total tide-over allocation stands at 33,294.198 metric tonnes (MT), which comprises 26,835.124 MT of rice and 6,459.074 MT of wheat.