Bearish wheat prices may reverse the trend in the near-term as the governments — both Centre and States — go all out to ensure better realisation to the growers in the run-up to the elections later this year. Declaration of bonus over the minimum support price by the key producing States, a potential increase in import duty and hike in procurement target coupled with lower-than-expected crop on account of decline in acreage could aid the price trend of the main rabi cereal. Since early January, wheat prices have turned bearish as traders have been liquidating their stocks ahead of the harvest season. We will be starting the year 2018-19 with a stock of around 12 million tonnes and the production is likely to be between 86 and 88 million tonnes,” said Amit Bharadwaj, CEO of Level A Commodities. He said the lower crop is on account of drop in acreage and also due to unfavourable climatic conditions being witnessed in the main producing States. Looking at the scenario, we expect the situation to be tight this year. India’s wheat output stood at 98.4 mt during 2017-18 and the imports during the year stood at around 1.7 mt — down from 5.5 mt the previous year.