Wheat slightly up on lower-level buying.

MUMBAI: India's wheat futures were slightly up in afternoon trades on Friday due to some buying interest at lower levels, analysts said. Expectation of bumper crop and the government's stock release plan, however, restricted the gains. "Wheat is trading in a very narrow range. Some buying interest is supporting wheat futures at lower levels but prices are unlikely to sustain as overall fundamentals are bearish," said Sudha R. Acharya, analyst at Kotak Commodities Services Ltd.

At 2:58 p.m., October wheat on the National Commodity and Derivatives Exchange (NCDEX) was up 0.31 percent to 1,227.60 rupees per 100 kg. The contract has fallen 1.16 percent this week. India has no immediate plan to allow wheat exports by the private sector, the farm minister said on Friday.

India's wheat harvest in 2011 is seen at 82 million tonnes, Farm Secretary P.K. Basu said on Friday, up from this year's 80.71 million tonnes. This is likely to weigh down international prices of the foodgrain.

The Indian government will free 2.5 million tonnes of grains from its stocks for sale to states, Farm Minister Sharad Pawar had said earlier. India, which curbed grain exports in recent years to head off domestic price rises, made some concessions to export to neighbouring Bangladesh recently after some global suppliers cancelled deals to ship Black Sea wheat since Russia curbed grain exports.

Source : economictimes.indiatimes.com