Reading Maize Through a Record and a Squeeze: A GRAIN Briefing on Prices 35 Per Cent Above MSP and a Kharif Crop Cut by a Sixth
Maize was supposed to be the quiet grain this kharif — the one with a record crop behind it and an MSP that barely moved. Instead it is trading at records. This briefing spells the squeeze out: G-R-A-I-N. Prices are up 30 to 40 per cent in five weeks, the trade's own estimate cuts the kharif crop by a sixth, buyers have contracted more imports in two months than India brought in during the whole of last year, and the ethanol tender has just removed sugar from the other side of the feedstock contest. The MSP, at ₹2,410 a quintal, is no longer the price that matters in most mandis. It is the floor the market has left behind — except in the pockets it has not.
G — Ground: the kharif crop has been cut by a sixth, on the trade's estimate
Start with the crop, because everything else prices off it. The livestock feed industry's association, CLFMA, estimates kharif maize production at 23.2 million tonnes, down 16.8 per cent, with drought cutting output by 33 per cent in Karnataka and 24 per cent in Maharashtra. That is an industry estimate, not an official count, and it should be read as one. The Agriculture Ministry is still assessing kharif production, taking in El Niño drought and the southern cyclones, as BusinessLine reported on 9 November. A separate projection, from the US Department of Agriculture, puts India's 2026-27 maize production 10 per cent lower — a forecast, labelled as such when it was reported on 27 October. Two independent cuts, one official silence. Until the ministry publishes, the market is pricing the trade's number, and the trade's number is short.
R — Records: prices up 30 to 40 per cent in five weeks
The price move has been fast enough to embarrass anyone carrying a September procurement budget. Maize prices have jumped 30 to 40 per cent in the past four to five weeks, BusinessLine reported, and CLFMA's chairman, Sumit Sureka, said he had never seen maize prices like these in more than 30 years in the feed industry. Feedmakers in West Bengal are buying at ₹31,000 to ₹32,000 a tonne — ₹3,100 to ₹3,200 a quintal. At Warangal on 29 October the market printed ₹3,255 per quintal, a local record, and feed bids at Coimbatore reached ₹3,400 to ₹3,450. Set those against the floor: the CCEA set the kharif MSP at ₹2,410 per quintal, a ₹10 rise on last season, against a cost of ₹1,544. Warangal's print sits 35 per cent above that floor. Coimbatore's top bid sits 43 per cent above it.
| Maize price reference, late Oct – early Nov 2026 | ₹ per quintal | Vs MSP ₹2,410 |
|---|---|---|
| MSP, Kharif Marketing Season 2026-27 | 2,410 | — |
| Jalana mandi, lowest in latest Maharashtra reporting | 1,963 | -19% |
| Maharashtra average mandi price, 9 Nov | 2,660 | +10% |
| West Bengal feedmaker buying, per BusinessLine | 3,100–3,200 | +29% to +33% |
| Warangal market, 29 Oct (local record) | 3,255 | +35% |
| Coimbatore feed bids, late Oct | 3,400–3,450 | +41% to +43% |
MSP: CCEA Kharif MSP release for 2026-27. Maharashtra and Jalana figures: APMC/Agmarknet data via Mandi Bhav India, as of 9 November 2026. Warangal and Coimbatore: FarMart data reported 4 November 2026. West Bengal: BusinessLine, 9 November 2026. Farmioc.
A — Arrivals: a record average in Maharashtra, and a mandi still below MSP
Do not read the records as a national price. Maharashtra's November monthly average, on APMC and Agmarknet data, is ₹2,674 per quintal — the highest monthly average in a series that runs back to 2001, and 67 per cent above November last year. The state's average mandi price on 9 November was ₹2,660. Yet the lowest rate in the same reporting window, at Jalana, was ₹1,963 per quintal, nearly a fifth below MSP. Both figures come off the same government reporting system in the same week. The gap between them is the harvest itself: where new-crop arrivals have landed in volume, prices sit near or under the floor; where they have not, feed and starch buyers are bidding against each other for old-crop grain. A single all-India maize price does not exist this month. There is a map, and the map has a ₹1,500 spread across it.
I — Imports: two months of contracts exceed a full year of buying
When domestic buyers start paying import parity, the cargoes follow. Importers have contracted 104,000 tonnes from Myanmar for November–December shipment, on FarMart's count — almost 1.8 times India's total maize imports of about 59,000 tonnes in the previous financial year. Gujarat Ambuja took 60,000 tonnes at about $303 a tonne for Kandla; Shanthi Feeds and SKM took 44,000 tonnes at about $307 for Tuticorin. Those landed prices are the ceiling the domestic market is now testing: a Warangal print of ₹3,255 a quintal leaves little room before Myanmar grain, freight paid, is the cheaper tonne in the south. The starch industry, meanwhile, is asking the government to allow duty-free imports temporarily. That request tells its own story. Starch makers do not lobby for import windows when domestic supply is comfortable.
N — Next pull: an 11 billion litre tender with sugar switched off
The demand side will not rescue prices by going away. The oil marketing companies' tender of 16 October seeks about 11 billion litres of ethanol for the supply year that began on 1 November, to hold the 20 per cent petrol blend. Sugar diversion for ethanol has been set to zero for 2026-27, and no bids were sought for juice, syrup or B-heavy molasses ethanol. What remains eligible is grain: maize, broken rice, FCI surplus rice and C-heavy molasses. FarMart estimates about 10 million tonnes of maize went into ethanol in 2024/25, so grain distillers start the year as one of the crop's largest buyers, competing with a feed sector that, on the National Egg Coordination Committee's figures cited by the distillers' association, takes 55 to 60 per cent of India's maize consumption. And the tender squeezes the distillers even as it leans on them: the maize ethanol price was cut to ₹68.86 per litre from ₹71.86, with the incentive halved to ₹2.79. The All India Distillers' Association has asked for ₹75 per litre, pointing to maize at ₹26 to ₹27 a kilo against ₹18 to ₹19 a year ago. Somebody in that chain absorbs the difference. At current grain prices, it will not be the farmer.
The decision
For feed and starch buyers: contract against the map, not the headline. Sourcing out of arrival-heavy districts, where prices still test the MSP, beats chasing Warangal or Coimbatore prints, and the Myanmar landed cost near $303 to $307 a tonne is now a live benchmark for southern buying, not a theoretical one. For lenders with poultry, feed and distillery exposure: the stress sits in working capital, not demand — a 30 to 40 per cent feedstock rise in five weeks, against an ethanol realisation that fell ₹3 a litre, is a margin event for borrowers on both sides of the grain. For traders: the two releases that can break this market are the ministry's kharif estimate and the pace of November arrivals; until the first lands, every price is being set against an industry estimate of a crop cut by a sixth. Farmioc's PriceHub tracks prices, trends and forecasts for 200+ crops across India, so mandi prices, MSP and import parity for a grain like maize sit in one view while the official count is still pending.