Finance
Bangladesh Rice Price Rice prices moving up in Bangladesh
Dhaka, 26 December 2020: Ordinary people have been suffering due to rising rice prices for some time now.
The government is not able to procure aman rice as per the target due to high prices in the market. On the one hand the suffering of the people, on the other hand the control of the market has created an uncomfortable situation by reducing the food stocks of the government. In this situation, Food Minister Sadhan Chandra Majumder is coming to the press conference about the rice market. The minister will address a virtual press conference on Sunday (December 26).
On Saturday (December 26) afternoon, Food Ministry Public Relations Officer (Senior Information Officer) Sumon Mehedi said, "The Minister (Food Minister) will hold a press conference on the government's steps to keep the rice market stable." The press conference will be held on Sunday at 11:30 am through the online zoom app.
The country's rice market has been on the rise for some time. Even though the season is full of aman, the price of coarse rice for the poor has reached Rs 50 per kg. Low-income people are struggling to buy rice.
The government's aman procurement program is going to fail due to high rice prices in the market. At the same time, government reserves are declining. In this situation, the government has started importing to handle the market.
Compared to last year, the government's food grain stocks have halved. According to the data of the Food Department on December 24, the total stock of government food grains is 8 lakh 46 thousand 350 tons, of which rice is 5 lakh 42 thousand 60 tons and wheat is 2 lakh 4 thousand 290 tons.
At the same time last year, the total stockpile was 13 lakh 7 thousand 280 tons, of which 10 lakh 59 thousand 60 tons of rice and 3 lakh 26 thousand 220 tons of wheat.
At a meeting of the Food Planning and Containment Committee on October 26, it was decided to purchase 200,000 metric tonnes of paddy directly from farmers at Tk 28 per kg during the current aman season. Besides, the target was set to buy 6 lakh tonnes of boiled rice at Tk 36 per kg and 50,000 tonnes of atap rice at Tk 38 per kg.
But as the price of paddy rice is much higher in the market, there is no progress in procurement. Farmers and mill owners are not showing interest in giving paddy and rice to government warehouses. According to the Food Department on December 23, 306 tonnes of paddy, 13,056 tonnes of boiled rice and 448 tonnes of sun-dried rice were collected.
